Wyden on FISA Surveillance: “The Only Path Forward is Reform.”

Wyden on FISA Surveillance: "The Only Path Forward is Reform."

Wyden delivers floor remarks following postponed FISA reauthorization vote

The Senate is delaying a vote on FISA because members are waking up to the fact that this surveillance authority is too dangerous to hand any president without new reforms. Let's face it, if there were the votes to advance this bill today, we'd be voting. When it comes to reauthorizing Section 702, the only path forward is reform.

Let's recount how we got here. Two weeks ago the leadership in the House of Representatives executed the oldest play in the book when it comes to surveillance. They waited until a week before Section 702 was set to expire, said there was no time for debate, and tried to pass a straight reauthorization of the law with no new reforms. What happened? A bipartisan coalition opposed it vociferously.

So they came back with a new bill that week, and claimed it DID have reforms. But as it turned out, those so-called reforms actually made FISA 702 LESS accountable. That bill failed, with 20 Republicans joining nearly every single Democrat to oppose it. Then the House voted on a straight extension of the law, again with no reforms. And again, a bipartisan coalition voted it down.

And now, this week, House Republican leadership once again tried to sell fake reforms to members for a third time. And once again, that body is in disarray, because members aren't going to buy fake reforms.

M. President, it's clear that Senators who have voted to support the current FISA surveillance law in the past are rethinking their positions today, under this president.

Every day this administration demonstrates its contempt for the rule of law and its thirst for absolute power in the White House. They have destroyed oversight and guardrails, and trampled on the rights of Americans. They've attacked and killed protesters and observers, seized the records of journalists, and investigated Trump's political and personal enemies, including members of Congress.

There are many ways in which Section 702 can be abused by this administration, including the warrantless searches of Americans' communications in Section 702 data. And there are already screaming alarm bells pointing to administration abuses.

What kind of abuses are we talking about? Month after month, Trump administration officials have been trotting out conspiracy theories about elections and voting. Those conspiracy theories include accusations of foreign involvement. The Director of National Intelligence even showed up at the FBI's ballot seizing raid in Fulton Country, Georgia. And one of her excuses for being there was to protect against foreign interference. These conspiracy theories open the door for conducting warrantless Section 702 searches on election and other political officials - all to help Donald Trump as he tries to discredit American elections.

The Trump Administration has also been abusing its authorities to go after journalists whose stories they don't like. All it takes is an accusation of a foreign connection - maybe a foreign source - and they can be subjected to Section 702 searches. Then there are protesters whom the Trump Administration could accuse of being connected to the so-called "Antifa" groups the Administration just designated as foreign terrorist groups.

When all the guardrails are gone, and the abuses are clear, there is only one solution - Congress must require court-ordered warrants to conduct searches on Americans. There should be certain exceptions, such as for emergency situations, but the court is the only guardrail left.

There's one final issue I want to raise, and that's the role of AI in supercharging surveillance abuses. The Trump Administration is going full speed ahead on AI and Americans are rightly concerned about how AI will affect their privacy rights. In the case of Section 702, the government could use AI to process huge amounts of disparate data to identify Americans for warrantless searches. These technological advances are happening very fast, and Congress needs to step up and protect Americans. New tools require new rules.

Colleagues, when the Senate returns to vote on government surveillance, another attempt to jam through this bill without reforms would be another dead end. I urge all members to get serious about coming to the table in a bipartisan way. Security and liberty are not mutually exclusive, and the only way to renew FISA 702 over the long term is to put strong new protections into black-letter-law.

So I am glad to see that the Senate is postponing this vote, which would be a victory for the Status Quo caucus and for a president who is bent on abusing my authority. I withdraw my objection and I look forward to working with my colleagues to pass real reforms.

Click here to watch video of remarks.