House lawmakers voted overnight Friday to briefly extend an expiring warrantless surveillance program, after a restive wing of the Republican caucus refused to go along with Speaker Mike Johnson’s push to reauthorize the controversial law.
The 10-day extension, which must also be approved by the Senate, will allow the House more time to seek a compromise.
Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) permits the U.S. government to collect from American communications firms the texts, emails and phone calls of foreigners living overseas, without a warrant. It is due to expire Monday.
Trump administration officials have said the tool is vital to protecting U.S. citizens, from rescuing Americans held hostage abroad to preventing terrorist attacks. But it has also been a longtime target of civil libertarians in Congress, including many members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, who are troubled by aspects of the program that they say could infringe on Americans’ privacy rights.
Some Democrats have also expressed fears that, without better safeguards, the law could be exploited by the administration to spy on people and groups who oppose President Donald Trump. The White House has rejected assertions that the program is vulnerable to abuse.
Johnson (R-Louisiana), who can afford to lose only two votes with his razor-thin majority, twice tried and failed to reauthorize the program early Friday morning before clearing a stopgap measure that would allow talks to continue until April 30.
The episode is the latest instance during Trump’s second term in which ideological differences have split House Republicans and undercut the president’s desire for swift legislative action. He has faced pushback from within the GOP on range of issues, from his controversial trade agenda to matters of domestic spending and foreign policy.
The failed votes followed days of negotiations this week, in which House leadership repeatedly delayed considering the legislation in hopes of striking a deal with Republican members demanding changes to the program.
The administration, meanwhile, has increased its pressure campaign on House lawmakers opposed to the bill, dispatching CIA Director John Ratcliffe — a former House member — to Capitol Hill this week and warning that losing Section 702 would imperil U.S. national security.
On Tuesday, Trump called on Republicans to “stick together” and swiftly extend the program, writing in a social media post that the U.S. military “desperately needs FISA 702, and it is one of the reasons we have had such tremendous SUCCESS on the battlefield, both in Venezuela and Iran.”
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine also urged lawmakers to back the renewal in a letter sent to Capitol Hill on Monday, arguing that a failed vote would “increase risk to the Joint Force, degrade our worldwide combat lethality, and significantly impair” U.S. national security, according to a copy of the document obtained by The Washington Post.
Members of the Freedom Caucus have urged amendments to the program, including a requirement for national security agencies to obtain a warrant before searching for data involving Americans, for example in cases when foreign nationals targeted under the program are communicating with U.S. citizens.
“We understand and agree with the president that we need 702 authority to go after bad guys abroad,” said Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a Freedom Caucus member, in an interview this week. “We’re fighting for greater protections.”
But administration officials say that requiring a warrant can be a lengthy process that could impede the timely provision of intelligence for national security purposes.
One of the two votes that failed overnight represented an attempt by House leadership and civil libertarians to find a compromise, permitting slight revisions to the program in exchange for an extension of five years. The deal ultimately failed to satisfy the Republican holdouts who see this as a rare opportunity to force changes.
“I will be voting NO on final passage of the FISA 702 Reauthorization Bill if it does not include a warrant provision and other reforms to protect US citizens’ right to privacy,” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) wrote in a social media post Wednesday.
The House later voted down a proposed 18-month extension of the program without changes.
Johnson is limited in what changes he can permit to the program without alienating other parts of his majority and some national-security-oriented Democrats who are likely to support its final passage.
Rep. Jim Himes (Connecticut), the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, this week hosted a call with senior intelligence officials from the Biden administration and around three dozen Democratic colleagues to make the case for reauthorizing the tool, a congressional aide said.
Himes has pushed for an amendment that would require the FBI to seek approval from a court that oversees the FISA program before accessing data collected on U.S. persons, political organizations and nonprofits — an attempt to find a middle ground between national security hawks who want to continue the program without revisions and civil libertarians pushing for a full warrant requirement.
“Nobody wants to have this conversation in 30 days. Just get it done now,” Himes said in an interview Thursday.
According to Trump administration talking points shared with Capitol Hill this month, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court approved certifications that would allow the government to continue collecting data for a year even if Congress failed to renew the program. The possibility could prompt telecommunications firms to stop providing the information, though, out of concern that doing so could lead to legal challenges.
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