There Was Some Good News and Bad News Yesterday as Concerns the Protection of Civil Liberties in this Country...
Statement
There was some good news and bad news yesterday as concerns the protection of civil liberties in this country. As you may know, on June 1st the authorization expired for Section 215 of the Patriot Act. This was the part of the bill that the NSA and other government agencies used as justification for bulk data collection without the need for a warrant. This was a significant win for those who had argued that this bulk data collection violated our 4th Amendment rights. The good news is that Section 215 as we used to know it is not coming back. The bad news is that it is not gone for good, as the Senate passed the USA Freedom Act yesterday, which reauthorized a different version of bulk data collection.
This tweak satisfied those who were concerned about the legality of the data collection, but not those of us who had a more fundamental problem with the idea that the government could collect data from entire zip codes without a standard warrant. When the federal district court in New York ruled that the government did not have the authority for its program, there were two paths: either let the program expire or give it explicit authorization. The USA Freedom Act introduces some new limits for the NSA, such as shifting the holding of data over to telecom companies and requiring more detailed orders to access that information. But it also, for the first time, gives explicit authorization to the data collection program. As such, our 4th Amendment rights against warrantless searches could still be violated. The next step for those concerned about liberty is to have the Supreme Court weigh in on the constitutionality of this part of the Patriot Act, but that will be somewhere down the road.
It is encouraging that despite the preferences of some in the Senate and the House that a simple reauthorization of the program was not jammed through, as can often be the case with controversial issues. This suggests to me that members of Congress are hearing the same concerns that I hear from people at home about government overreach. So although the end result was not ideal, there is momentum for reform. I'll keep you posted as more develops.
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