From The Nation
US House and Senate leaders have reached a bipartisan backroom deal to
push for approval of a four-year extension of the the most controversial
components of the USA Patriot Act, in a move that rejects calls for responsible reform of the law by civil libertarians on the right and the left.
With prodding from the Obama White House -- which has been working for
months to secure a long-term extension of the Patriot Act -- and Senate majority leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky,
and House speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, there will be a full-court
press in coming days to win Congressional approval for the extension of Patriot Act provisions that are set to expire May 27.
But there will be opposition from both sides of the aisle to this bad
bipartisanship. The toughest test will come in the House, where a
coalition of Tea Party conservatives and united Democratic caucus could
upset the rush to approve the extension.
It will be tough to block a lobbying push by key congressional
leaders, especially in the Senate, where Reid and McConnell are
co-sponsoring the extension proposal. But there is no question that
there will be significant opposition to this assault on basic
constitutional values.
As Shahid Buttar, executive director of the Bill of Rights Defense
Committee, says: "This agreement reeks of all the worst things about
Washington: secrecy, back-room dealing, institutional co-optation, and
bipartisan collusion to undermine constitutional rights. The death of
Osama bin Laden offered the hope that our nation's leaders might finally
restore sanity to the national security establishment in the wake of
mounting documented abuses. Instead, they insulated it from debate and
rammed the Patriot Act down the throats of hundreds of millions of
law-abiding Americans. I am, quite frankly, disgusted."
Click Here to Read Whole Article
Among the Patriot Act provisions that congressional leaders hope to extend without any changes, until June 1, 2015, are sections that (in the words of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee) outline:
1.) The government's power under Patriot Section 215 to obtain secret
court orders for "any tangible thing" -- including Internet, phone and
business records -- that the government believes is relevant to a terrorism
investigation.
2.) The government's power to use non-specific "roving" wiretaps to
monitor any phone number, e-mail account, or other communications
facility that the government believes is being used by its target.
3.) The "lone wolf" wiretapping power, which allows the government it
to monitor individuals who have no connection to any foreign power or
terrorist group.
The leadership deal was decried by the a broad cross-section of civil
libertarians, with the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, warning that
"the Patriot Act is being set up -- yet again -- to force profound abuses on
the American people without any meaningful debate."
The worst part of the deal making on the part of the House and Senate
leaders -- with prodding from the Obama White House -- is that it extends
abusive components of the Patriot Act that were in the process of being
reformed.
The Senate Judiciary Committee has approved legislation sponsored by
the committee chair, Senator Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, that would
require greater auditing and public reporting of surveillance
initiatives.
Now, even those modest attempts to impose a measure of accountability appear to have been abandoned.
"It's shocking that even some of those requirements are now down the
drain for another four years," explained Michelle Richardson, a
legislative counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union.
If the Congress approves the deal being pushed by the congressional
leaders, Richardson said, work by civil libertarians, constitutional
scholars and citizens across the United States to address the worst
abuses associated with the Patriot Act -- and, ultimately, to guard against
those abuses -- will end with "no reform and no long-lasting institutional
oversight."
Republican leaders in the House are preparing to "whip" members to back the agreement.
But individual Republican members are objecting as this week's debate approaches.
Next Page 1 | 2
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
John Nichols, a pioneering political blogger, has written the Online Beat since 1999. His posts have been circulated internationally, quoted in numerous books and mentioned in debates on the floor of Congress.
Nichols writes about (more...)