By Brian Dulle
Congressman Tim Huelskamp (R-Kansas) made the following statement in response to the UK Guardian newspaper's shocking revelations:
"While some members of Congress were made aware of and approved of this secret, blanket, domestic surveillance program, I was never briefed on it and never approved it. The use of this indiscriminate, data-mining practice against U.S. citizens on U.S. soil without probably cause infringes upon the fundamental constitutional rights of tens of millions of unsuspecting, law-abiding Americans.
Americans were wrong to rely on the veracity of candidate Obama's promise that this spying would stop. Indeed, it has apparently been expanded under the Obama Administration. Numerous colleagues and I are sending a strong letter to the President demanding a full explanation of this invasion of privacy and apparent violation of the 4th Amendment.
Together with the revelations of the misuse and abuse of power at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), this raises even more distrust and fundamental concern about President Obama's willingness to trample on the privacy rights of American citizens.