Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, left, backed by
the Intelligence Committee chairman, Sen. Richard
Burr, moved late Tuesday toward asking the Senate to
reauthorize the measure without committee
consideration.
By
Brian Bennett
Senate Republicans have launched the opening
salvo in a battle over government surveillance
powers, introducing a bill to preserve intact the
National Security Agency’s authority to store and
search domestic telephone records.
Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden sparked a
public furor in 2013 when he leaked documents
showing that the spy agency was secretly collecting
telephone metadata – records showing the time, date,
duration and numbers called – for use in
terrorism investigations.
Despite vows by President Obama to limit the
program, and concern by civil liberties groups and
some on Capitol Hill that it went too far in
invading Americans' privacy in the name of national
security, the NSA archiving of U.S. phone records
has continued essentially unchanged.
A report released Wednesday by the Director of
National Intelligence indicates that the records
were checked for 227 "known or presumed" Americans
last year. That compares with 248 in 2013, the first
year such figures were released.
Legal authority for the program, contained in
Section 215 of the Patriot Act, is set to expire
June 1. That has set off a race between lawmakers
who want to preserve the government's surveillance
powers and those who want to rein them in.
In an unusual procedural move, the GOP measure to
extend the NSA’s so-called “bulk collection” of
phone records was not considered by any Senate
committee. Instead, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell
(R-Ky.), backed by the Intelligence Committee
chairman, Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), moved about 10
p.m. Tuesday to ask the full Senate to reauthorize
Section 215 without changes.
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) criticized the
late-night maneuver, saying the GOP leadership in
the Senate is “trying to quietly pass a straight
reauthorization of the bulk collection program that
has been proven ineffective and unnecessary.”
Leahy, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary
Committee, which would have considered the
legislation, said he would oppose any bill that does
not contain “meaningful” reforms to the collection
program.
“This tone deaf attempt to pave the way for five
and a half more years of unchecked surveillance will
not succeed,” Leahy said in a statement.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said he would
consider “some reforms” to the program, “but my No.
1 goal of the Patriot Act is to make sure we don’t
have another 9/11.... I will not vote for Patriot
Act that is compromised.”
A bill to limit the NSA's bulk-collection of
telephone data passed the House last year but failed
in the Senate.
Intelligence officials have said the then-secret
archives had helped authorities stop at least a
dozen terrorist plots. Critics say only one case was
discovered as a direct result of a phone record
search: an Anaheim cab driver who was sentenced in
2014 for sending money to an Al Qaeda cell in
Somalia.
“Given the number of foreign fighters going to
Syria, and Al Qaeda having an even freer hand in
Yemen, we should think carefully before restricting
important intelligence authorities,” Michael Allen,
a former chief of staff for the House Intelligence
Committee, said in an interview.
The top Democrat on the House Intelligence
Committee, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank), said the
possibility that the provision will expire June 1
could create enough pressure on opponents to agree
to some changes to the program.
“This is the one opportunity we have to use the
sunset as a lever to get some reform done,” Schiff
said in an interview.
Despite the move by Senate Republicans to
preserve the NSA program intact, House Republicans
appear more willing to hem in the agency's ability
to collect intelligence on Americans.
A bipartisan group in the House is set to
introduce legislation that would curtail bulk
collection, establish an independent advocate on the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court that helps
oversee government spying, and more narrowly define
so-called selector terms used by the NSA to define
the scope of data requested from U.S. phone
companies, among other provisions.
Under the program, the NSA does not obtain the
content of communications or audio of phone
conversations. The data in the phone records are
searched for connections to telephone numbers used
by known or suspected terrorists and their
associates.
But privacy advocates say that the times, dates
and the numbers called, when mapped together, open
an intrusive window on the activities and
associations of Americans.
Times staff writer Lisa Mascaro contributed
to this report.
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@ByBrianBennett.
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2015, Los Angeles
Times
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