Massie and Nap: Government surveillance program set to expire by years’ end

[Brian4Liberty]

Government surveillance program set to expire by years’ end

Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) discusses whether Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Act should be renewed.

[Mach]

Large portions of America are disgusted with politicians and their constant lies and deceit, but keep voting them back in....



https://www.justsecurity.org/50801/h...eeps-clothing/

House leadership is about to make another attempt at what it failed to do in December: push through an updated version of the House Intelligence Committee’s FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act of 2017 by claiming the bill is a surveillance reform measure. The bill would reauthorize and expand – rather than reform – Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the provision that allows the government to warrantlessly collect the communications of non-Americans located abroad, including their communications with Americans.

As the December 31 sunset date for this law approached, House leadership chose not to hold a vote on the Judiciary Committee’s compromise bill to reform and reauthorize Section 702, known as the USA Liberty Act, which includes some meaningful reforms and appears to have overwhelming bipartisan support. Instead, they tried to force a vote on a modified version of the House Intelligence Committee’s Section 702 reauthorization bill, which privacy groups strongly opposed.

Once it became clear that the vote would fail, leadership abandoned its attempt to pass the Intelligence Committee’s bill, and Congress instead passed a short-term extension of Section 702 to Jan. 19, 2018. Appallingly, House leadership has chosen to advance a re-modified version (S. 139) of the Intelligence Committee’s bill, which still only pretends to be a reform bill, to a vote this week.

Members of Congress should recognize that this bill is a wolf in sheep’s clothing: a surveillance expansion bill masquerading as a reform bill. Unless amendments are adopted that would transform this bill, Congress should reject it and demand a bill that incorporates the robust privacy safeguards for Section 702 that privacy advocates have been calling for since before the Snowden disclosures.

[Brian4Liberty]

There is supposed to be a vote today on Massie/Lofgren amendment to require warrants for unmasking FISA searches. Not sure when that will happen.