ACLU National Security Project

The ACLU National Security Project is presented as both a legal participant in the effort to publish Mohamedou Ould Slahi’s censored manuscript and a source of records essential to understanding it. Its contribution joins two kinds of work: helping secure public release of the manuscript and using litigation to bring government documents into the public record.

Role in the Legal Team

The project’s attorneys were among the co-counsel who worked with Slahi’s pro bono legal team. The lawyers fought for more than six years to have the manuscript cleared for public release, arguing that truthful publication could be compatible with security. The acknowledgments identify Hina Shamsi, Brett Kaufman, Jonathan Manes, and Melissa Goodman as co-counsel from the ACLU National Security Project, alongside Slahi’s lead attorneys and other counsel. The book credits this sustained effort with making it possible for readers to encounter a work that had remained subject to severe censorship restrictions.

Litigation and the Documentary Record

The project’s Freedom of Information Act litigation unearthed a trove of secret government documents about post-9/11 detention and interrogation practices. The book treats that material as a historical record against which Slahi’s account could be compared, not as a license to claim certainty where documents remain withheld. Separately, the editorial notes draw on declassified records, investigative reporting, and government inquiries to assess what may plausibly correspond to redactions. The editor stresses that the notes do not reconstruct the original censored text or disclose classified information, and that the speculations are his responsibility.

Contribution to Reading the Manuscript

The documentary record made possible a method of close comparison: Slahi’s narrative could be considered alongside official records, including accounts of interrogation practices and the documents investigators later examined. This helps readers see where his account has corroboration while preserving the boundary between public evidence and inaccessible material. The project’s role is therefore not to supply a definitive version of every blacked-out passage, but to help make the surrounding history more legible and the limits of what can be known more explicit.