Providing for Consideration of H.R. Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act; Providing for Consideration of H.R. Extending Limits of U.S. Customs Waters Act; Providing for Consideration of H. Res. Denouncing the Biden Administration's Immigration Policies; and Providing for Consideration of H. Res. Opposing Efforts to Place One-Sided Pressure on Israel with Respect to Gaza

Floor Speech

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Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, for starters, we need to examine why we are being hustled to do this today.

When we extended FISA earlier, there was a provision in the bill that allowed the FISA court to extend, and they have taken advantage of that. They have extended FISA until June of 2025, and so I think we are being hustled here today for a reason, which is to prevent the Constitution from being applied to FISA.

Mr. Speaker, under the amendment being offered, a warrant would be required for a search of the data of U.S. persons. This is important. It would exclude imminent threats; exigent circumstances, as any warrant does; or exclude cases where a person consents to a search or where there is cybersecurity. It excludes metadata.

It is important to note that the FBI executed more than 200,000 warrantless searches of U.S. persons in 2022, including 141 Black Lives Matter protesters, 2 Members of Congress, journalists, commentators, political parties, donors to political campaigns. It is really outrageous. The base bill is insufficient to protect us. There are two major points that it makes. Neither makes any sense or any difference.

The big deal is a prohibition on U.S. person queries that are conducted solely for the evidence of a crime. That sounds good until it is realized that the FBI almost never does that. In fact, in 2022, there were only two cases in which that provision would have been a prohibition.

The second issue is codifying the regulations about searches by the FBI today. Obviously, that doesn't do any good because the FBI, under the current regulations, continues to violate our rights and to do warrantless searches.

The only way to end the abuse is to approve the warrant requirement that is being offered in the amendment. The American public agrees with us, with 76 percent of Americans supporting a requirement that the government get a warrant before searching in these cases.

Mr. Speaker, to hear the administration talk about it, getting a warrant here would be like the end of the world. In literally any other context, law enforcement or intelligence agencies who want to read Americans' communications have to get a warrant.

Actually, for the last 46 years, the government has had to get a FISA title I order to read Americans' communications in foreign intelligence investigations. These are investigations in which Americans are suspected of terrorism, espionage, cybercrimes, et cetera.

Hence, somehow a warrant for title I is consistent with national security, but it will plunge us into a dystopian nightmare if we apply this basic constitutional requirement where Americans aren't even suspected of wrongdoing.

This is not a wild idea. We have had, under the Obama administration, intelligence experts convene to examine this issue. The experts included former CIA directors, national security people from both parties. The experts unanimously agreed that we should have a warrant requirement in these circumstances.

Mr. Speaker, someone said that no court has ever required a warrant in these circumstances. That is incorrect. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals did point out that lawful collection alone isn't enough to justify a search.

In fact, when it comes to examining the need for this, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, which Congress created to take a look at the data that is classified, concluded that there was little justification on the relative value of the close to 5 million searches conducted by the FBI from 2019 to 2022.

The chair of the Board said this: ``In the strongest examples offered by the FBI, such as the `victim' or `defensive' query examples . . . the government would likely be able to meet the probable cause standard or one of the exceptions contemplated,'' namely, consent or exigent circumstances.

With a 15-year track record to draw on, the government has failed time and again to show it had derived unique and significant national security value from a U.S. person query that could not have been conducted--

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Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, I would note that the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board did recommend by a majority vote that a warrant requirement be imposed.

Mr. Speaker, to ignore this advice is to ignore our Constitution. We take an oath every Congress to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. This is a significant opportunity for us to uphold that oath.

The Fourth Amendment matters. If we do not take this opportunity to protect the privacy of Americans when it comes to this matter, we will, in my belief and my view, have failed in our obligation and our duty to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.

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