The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution says:
“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
Late last night, early this morning (after midnight), the United States Senate passed a FISA reauthorization bill that directly and specifically violates every tenant of the 4th Amendment.
The Senate voted to authorize warrantless federal government searches of every American’s private papers, effects, emails, electronic data records, cell phone calls, contact lists, text messages, buying habits, purchases, banking records, social media posts, direct messages, private communications and every keystroke of every electronic device in your life. All of it continues to be subject to the capture, review and surveillance of an unelected opaque law enforcement mechanism, and Congress supports it.
The issue is magnified, because the Supreme Court has never ruled on the constitutionality of the FISA-702 data collection system, because the Supreme Court also says no American has standing to challenge the federal government violation of their 4th Amendment right to privacy. It’s all infuriating… It’s all FUBAR!
Oh, and if you are reading this… you’re likely on the list.
Last night, Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) teamed up with Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) and added an amendment that would have required the government to get a warrant before reviewing any communications incidentally collected from Americans. The amendment was the last effort priority for a smidgen of hope; the IC railed against it, saying it would stop them from acting on critical “national security” information in real time. It failed by a vote of 42 to 50.
Another Democrat Senator, Ron Wyden (Oregon), a senior member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, vowed and pledged that FISA-702 would never be renewed by any measure that required his signature. “I’ll do everything in my power to stop it,” he previously said. “Searches have gone after American protesters, political campaign donors, even people who simply reported crimes to the FBI. The abuses have been extensive and well documented,” Wyden argued to colleagues. Wyden’s effort to strike the language failed by a vote of 34 to 58.
“Egregious Fourth Amendment violations against U.S. citizens will increase dramatically if this bill is passed into law,” Utah Republican Senator Mike Lee warned. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) offered an amendment to block DHS, FBI, DOJ, IRS, and various ancillary intelligence, law enforcement, national parks and government agencies from buying Americans’ electronic NSA data from third parties and federal contractors. Paul’s amendment failed by a vote of 31 to 61.
The House and Senate bill does include provisions that would force the Intelligence Community to notify political leadership in Congress about 702 database searches involving lawmakers, but you, Comrade Citizen, are not allowed to know about the searches done on you. You, comrade prole, must improve your elite status if you wish to participate in any benefit from the shredded and reconfigured 4th Amendment, now reserved for the entitled class.
As noted by The Hill, “Senator Mike Lee offered an amendment to require the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to appoint an outside lawyer to argue for the rights of a U.S. person the government wants to surveil secretly. It would have also required government employees appearing before the FISA court to disclose factual evidence that might call into question the accuracy of their statements. It also failed even though it had previously passed the Senate with 77 votes in 2020.”
Go figure!
Hey, stop me when you start to notice something that looks like history rhyming.
There’s an inversion afoot. (More: Conservative Treehouse, 4/20/2024) (Archive)