The looming expiration of Section 702, a law enabling government agencies’ ability to collect communication data from targeted foreign entities but has consistently been shown to be used against US citizens, has sparked conflict between groups looking to maintain it and privacy activists who view the law as a circumvention of the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement for searches of American citizens’ communications.
House Speaker Mike Johnson has apparently flirted with the idea of reauthorizing Section 702 into a defense appropriations bill. Section 702 is a law that empowers government agencies to gather communication data from targeted foreign entities. However, there is ample evidence demonstrating that this law has been used to snoop on United States citizens.
Despite growing demands to gut Section 702’s powers, Johnson may proceed to reauthorize the measure via the National Defense Authorization Act.
Johnson’s office has been quiet with respect to these rumors as evidenced by its lack of response to requests for comment on the matter and any prospective changes proposed by the House Intelligence Committee to Section 702’s reauthorization.
Preceding reports suggested this was not the first instance of an attempt to insert an extension of Section 702 into the NDAA.
Generally speaking, the Judiciary Committee has pushed for reforming government surveillance programs whereas the Intelligence Committee has been in favor of the security agencies’ use of Section 702.
Government surveillance has become the norm in this era of massive government. The federal government currently has the ability to snoop on every facet of lawful people’s lives. Moreover, what Johnson and his colleagues are trying to do here is typical of DC.
When controversial legislation is put forward in DC, it’s often packaged in a broader, more innocuous type of bill. The goal here is to sneak legislation in while no one is looking. All told, if this Section 702 were voted on its own by its own merits, it would receive massive opposition.
This case shows the importance of always keeping tabs on the legislative developments in DC and other legislatures in the country. It’s these surreptitious moves that require us to be eternally vigilant in politics.