Section 215, Surveillance Reforms at Risk if Senate Fails To Pass USA Freedom, House Members Say
“If the Senate rejects the USA Freedom Act, Section 215 -- and likely the NSA program that some in the Senate are trying to preserve -- will expire before we reconvene on the evening of June 1,” said House Judiciary…
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Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., ranking member John Conyers, D-Mich., and Reps. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., and Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., in a joint statement Tuesday. If Section 215 expires, the “Senate will have blocked reform at great cost to the intelligence community,” they said. “The USA Freedom Act is the only option that does not lead down that path,” they said, as it ends bulk collection of data, increases transparency, prevents government overreach, and preserves key intelligence-gathering authorities by allowing the FBI to continue to use Section 215 and creating a targeted call detail records authority for the NSA. Congress must act before June 1 to reauthorize or amend Section 215 because three provisions of the Patriot Act, including 215, expire at midnight May 31, they said. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court order authorizing NSA’s bulk phone metadata program expires 5 p.m. June 1, they said. If the program sunsets, sweeping reforms and key authorities made to U.S. surveillance programs will be lost, and the sunset may be permanent, they said. The Senate had set a target of a Friday adjournment for the Memorial Day "state work period."