Massie and Lofgren Speak in Support of Amendment to Restrict Backdoor Surveillance
The 2015 version of the Massie-Lofgren amendment — the first bipartisan attempt to close NSA's backdoor search loophole on Americans' communications.
Original by RepThomasMassie on YouTube ↗ · Is this yours? Claim credit →
Transcript
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- mr chairman the american people don't want to be spied on by their own government our founding fathers included the fourth amendment for a reason to require
- probable cause and a warrant before the government and government agents can snoop on anyone during the 113th congress the house of representatives
- passed the bipartisan amendment i am offering today by a 293-123 vote this year our bipartisan group is
- reuniting once again to shut down unconstitutional surveillance that does not meet the expectations of our constituents or the standards required
- by our constitution our amendment shuts one form of backdoor surveillance by prohibiting warrantless searches of government databases for
- information that pertains to u.s citizens the director of national intelligence has confirmed that the government searches vast amounts of data
- including the content of emails and telephone calls without individualized suspicion or probable cause at this time i will submit for the record the letter from the director of
- national intelligence which confirms this warrantless spying the gentleman's request will be covered under general leave
- the director of the fbi has also confirmed that he uses the information to build criminal cases against u.s persons but the director of national
- intelligence and the fbi are not above the fourth amendment and this practice should end this time i would like to yield one and a half minutes
- to my uh colleague from california miss lofgren gentlewoman is recognized i think the gentleman for yielding uh in support of
- the massey lofgren amendment you know as has mentioned the declassified fisa court decision has indicated that substantially more warrantless
- communications are collected through 702 than 215. you know we had a a bill up to
- recently the usa freedom act that alleged that we were stopping bulk collection but we didn't and during the markup of that bill in the judiciary
- committee we offered this amendment and everyone in on the committee including the chairman of the committee said they
- were for this provision but it wasn't the right time well this is the right time and that's why we have this broad support
- it's the massey lofgren sensor brenner conyers poe gabbard jordan o'rourke its broadest bipartisan it's supported by
- groups like the american civil liberties union as well as the campaign for liberty the demand progress as well as freedom works this has broad bipartisan support
- and the american people deserve this that when we have a an interest in querying the 702 database for american
- citizens get a warrant that's what the fourth amendment requires finally this re closes
- the opportunity to require back doors on technology and as has been mentioned earlier by technologists and scientists
- to do that just opens a door wide open for the bad guys and the hackers to break in so i thank the gentleman fielding and yield back
- mr gentleman kentucky mr chairman as my colleague stated our amendment also prohibits the nsa and the cia from placing back doors into commercial
- products this is important because in december of 2013 it was reported that a u.s security company had received 10 million dollars
- from the nsa to use a flawed encryption method our government should strengthen technology that protects our privacy not take advantage of it at this time i'd
- like to reserve the balance of my time gentleman reserves for what purpose is the gentleman from new jersey right mr chairman i rise to claim time in
- opposition gentleman recognized for five minutes in opposition mr chairman of race to claim time in opposition to this amendment this amendment restricts the use of
- section 2 702 of fisa which is not currently up for reauthorization the law does not sunset until december
- of 2017. any reforms of this authority should be fully vetted by the authorizing committees and not inappropriately
- attached to our spending bill this amendment would impose greater restrictions on the intelligence community's ability to protect national
- security and create an impediment to our government's ability to locate threat information already in our government's possession
- such an impediment would potentially put american lives at risk of another terrorist attack colleagues the house recently passed h.r
- 3361 the us freedom act with overwhelm overwhelmingly bipartisan support was signed into law last week this
- amendment which seeks to relitigate an issue fully litigated in the drafting of that legislation a similar amendment was offered and
- rejected by the house judiciary committee during its markup of that bill the usa freedom act does include two reforms related to section 702
- collection these were reforms properly considered during the authorization process not slapped on an appropriations bill
- without consideration and deliberation the first limits the government's use of information about u.s persons that is
- obtained under section 0 702 that the fisa court later determines to be unlawful the second provision requires the
- director of national intelligence to report annually the number of u.s person queries under section 702 under current law a person can only be
- the target of an intelligence gathering under fisa pursuant to an interval individualized court order based upon
- probable cause the intelligence community is allowed to query communications illegally collects from foreigners for information about a
- u.s person so long as the query itself has foreign intelligence value there is no difference from traditional
- criminal law if the government has a legal wiretap on a drug dealer's cell phone and records the conversation where a second drug dealer talks about
- committing a murder police can use that phone call as evidenced against the second drug dealer in a murder trial
- what matters is that the initial wiretap or here the initial targeting of the foreign terrorist was legal
- colleagues this is an issue critical to our national security and it is complicated any changes to 702 should be fully
- evaluated and voted on using the authorization committee process which is the appropriate channel for considered review and debate
- on this critical issue unfortunately this amendment has not benefited from the work of the authorization process it would potentially put american lives
- greater at risk for another terrorist attack that's not a risk many of us are certainly i'm willing to take for these ro for this
- reason and many others i strongly oppose this amendment urge my colleagues to do the same and they yield back gentleman yields back gentlemen from kentucky mr chairman how much time do i
- have remaining one minute and 30 seconds at this time i yield 45 seconds to my colleague from california i thank the gentleman for
- yielding the unclassified fisa court reported that the 702 search had in fact
- scooped up vast amounts of holy domestic uh information how does this work the upstream communications are tapped
- into by the nsa and in the digital world your digital information your domestic information is stored throughout the united throughout the world it's scooped
- up and it's used the fbi has indicated it's used and the dni is indicated it's used for holy domestic purposes without
- a warrant routinely thousands tens of thousands of times it is in violation of the fourth amendment it must stop and i thank the gentleman
- for yielding and i just say on the judiciary committee every member of the committee who declined to support this amendment said they were for the
- amendment and said we should offer it to the dod appropriations bill and i yield back gentleman from kentucky
- now it's been said here tonight that this is not the time or the place to address these problems with 702 but look we have a constitutional crisis and this
- was the excuse we were given in the judiciary committee when my colleague tried to get the amendment allowed there it was the same excuse i was given in the rules
- committee when we had an opportunity to address this and i would maintain that 2017 two years from now is too long to
- go in this constitutional crisis situation where we recognize something that illegal and or unconstitutional is occurring yet we don't do anything about
- it so this is the time to do something about it this is the place to do something about it i urge my colleagues to vote for this amendment and i yield
- back the balance of my time