WASHINGTON, D.C. — According to reports from CQ-Roll Call and Wired, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer plans to jam an extension of an extremely controversial warrantless FISA spying authority into the upcoming “must-pass” Continuing Resolution. This authority, “Section 702,” has been continuously abused to undermine civil rights, including through facilitating unlawful spying on activists protesting the murder of George Floyd, members of Congress, journalists, online dating matches, and hundreds of thousands of others in the United States.
As intelligence officials have confided in private, as reported during the last reauthorization debate, and as explained here, Section 702 surveillance will continue without congressional action into April 2024. Any extension, however, would allow the government to obtain new year-long Section 702 certifications at the beginning of the year. Accordingly, even a one-week extension of Section 702 could perpetuate existing privacy abuses into 2025.
In response to this news, Demand Progress Policy Director Sean Vitka issued the following statement:
“The controversial warrantless surveillance of billions of communications simply does not belong in a Continuing Resolution or any other ‘must-pass’ legislation. Section 702’s end-of-year expiration has been on the calendar for over 5 years, and even that expiration won’t change surveillance practices until April 2024. Extending Section 702 in ‘must-pass’ legislation isn’t about weeks or months or even national security — it’s about preventing Congressional action to protect privacy.
“This unconscionable effort afoot, which we are appalled to hear Majority Leader Schumer is pushing forward this week, amounts to a desperate attempt to deprive his colleagues of even the chance to vote on serious privacy protections for Americans, leaving disproportionately targeted communities vulnerable to, among other things, agencies’ illegal exploitation of the Data Broker Loophole to buy location information without so much as a court order. If this is not corrected, Senator Schumer will soon find himself on the wrong side of history. The Senate must seize this once-in-a-generation opportunity, not perpetuate the well-documented abuses of Section 702.
“We urge Majority Leader Schumer to fight for the restoration of privacy of people in the United States, and in particular for the communities that have been most aggressively and most wrongfully targeted by law enforcement and intelligence agencies.”
Additional context:
Privacy advocates have for many months clearly communicated what Section 702’s reauthorization would require, with particular focus on comprehensive privacy protections that end backdoor searches of Americans’ warrantlessly acquired information and that close the Data Broker Loophole. So far, civil liberties champions in Congress are the only leaders to have proposed a path forward for Section 702, in the form of the Government Surveillance Reform Act, which we and dozens of other groups urge Majority Leader Schumer to support. This legislation would help restore the privacy of every person in the United States, but among its key reforms are many that would stop well-documented wrongful targeting of AAPI and other communities — communities Schumer would be selling out if he advances this misguided effort.
The robust coalition of dozens of organizations representing millions of Americans from across the political spectrum have throughout the year published copious documentation and other resources demonstrating the urgent need for reform. Coalition resource hubs are available here and here — the latter supports the Government Surveillance Reform Act. Acutely relevant to this development is this collection of known Section 702 civil rights abuses from the Brennan Center and this 63-organization call for reform organized by Stop AAPI Hate.