A group of House Democrats is pushing for significant changes to surveillance activities authorized in the 2001 Patriot Act before parts of the anti-terrorism law expire in December.
Twenty Democrats, in an Oct. 30 letter sent to House Judiciary Committee leaders, called for several tweaks to the Patriot Act, the surveillance bill passed just weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States. Three surveillance provisions in the Patriot Act will expire on Dec. 15 unless Congress reauthorizes them.
“While we do not believe that any administration should have the broad and unchecked surveillance powers permitted [in parts of the law], certainly the Trump administration should not be entrusted with these powers,” wrote the Democrats, led by Reps. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan. “Surveillance in the United States has always had a disproportionate impact on people of color, and this administration poses a unique threat to our most vulnerable communities.”
The Democrats point to law enforcement agencies targeting African American activists as “black identity extremists” and the Trump administration’s scrutiny of Muslim Americans.
Section 215 of the Patriot Act, one of the provisions due to expire, allows the FBI to ask for a court order to obtain “any tangible things,” including books, records, papers, and documents related to a terrorism investigation. That section of the law served as the foundation for the National Security Agency’s massive collection of telephone records for several years.
While the NSA reportedly suspended the telephone records collection program in 2018, the Democratic lawmakers called for Congress to end the program permanently.
Tlaib, in a statement, called the call records collection program “a grave threat to the constitutional rights of the American people.” Authorization for the program should sunset “because of its history of misuse and its inherently broad and intrusive reach,” she added.
The Democrats also want new protections against surveillance of free speech activities and audits of surveillance to check for the targeting of specific communities. The Democrats want additional transparency about the amount of information collected in Patriot Act surveillance activities, and they want to prohibit secret legal interpretations from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and the Department of Justice.
The Democrats’ effort echoes earlier calls by 39 digital and civil rights groups for Congress to put new restrictions on large-scale surveillance programs before extending the Patriot Act provisions.
The Trump administration and many Republicans in Congress have pushed for reauthorization of the expiring Patriot Act sections without changes. The Patriot Act, after it was amended in 2015 by the USA Freedom Act, “preserves significant national security authorities, enhances privacy and civil liberties protections, and increases transparency,” Joseph Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, said in September. The current law “provides us with the necessary tools to keep Americans safe.”
Democrats, however, have some leverage with their majority in the House. If the House does not vote to reauthorize the surveillance provisions, they would expire and leave intelligence agencies without some essential tools for tracking suspected terrorists. The Democrats signing the recent letter threatened to vote against reauthorization unless their reforms are implemented, but it’s unclear whether they would have enough votes to block any legislation.
Backers are optimistic about getting changes to the surveillance law, a spokesman for Tlaib said. “There’s bipartisan concern and agreement about [Section] 215 being government intrusion,” he added. “Folks across ideological lines are ringing alarms about this.”
Digital rights group Free Press Action praised the Democrats. “We don’t believe that any administration should have these sweeping powers, but this administration poses a unique threat to the most marginalized communities in the United States,” Sandra Fulton, government relations director for the group, said. “This Oval Office has been openly hostile to protesters — particularly protesters of color — immigrants, queer people, journalists and anyone else who questions Donald Trump’s actions.”
