With a portion of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) expiring later this week, Congress is racing to renew the national security measure after a controversial appointment has some members wary.
Section 702 of the FISA allows the government to collect communications involving foreign targets overseas without a traditional warrant, even when those communications include Americans. Without congressional renewal, the authority will expire on June 12, potentially limiting intelligence collection by the NSA and FBI.
Congress routinely sets expiration dates on Section 702 to ensure oversight, most recently in 2024. Reauthorization talks stalled after Federal Housing Finance Director Bill Pulte was named acting director of national intelligence, prompting Democratic opposition over his qualifications. Extending the program before its expiration now appears increasingly unlikely.
“The naming of Pulte to that position, although the timing arguably wasn't the best, I still don't think it ought to derail something that's this important," Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-DK) said.
In a briefing earlier this week, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said the reversal of Pulte’s appointment is mandatory for House Democrats to even consider renewing Section 702.
“Someone who’s a political hack, a malignant clown and is woefully unqualified to serve in any position in the federal government,” Jeffries said. “To get to good negotiations, the effort to elevate Bill Pulte as the acting director of national intelligence should be reversed immediately.”
Although Texas Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) voted in favor of the extension, he later told the New York Times that he did not think naming Pulte days before this vote seemed “like a very smart idea.”
“The Senate doesn’t have any role to play in terms of confirming acting officials, but I see no evidence of any qualifications for that job,” Sen. Cornyn said to reporters on the day of Pulte’s appointment.
Several Republican senators joined Democrats in opposing the extension, citing privacy concerns. In April, Congress passed two short-term extensions of the program after House lawmakers sought to add amendments requiring the government to obtain warrants before accessing Americans' communications collected under Section 702.
Representative Chip Roy (R-TX) pushed back on the Senate for not supporting these amendments, which he said would protect Americans from potential abuses of government power.
“Under no circumstances should we allow technology to breach the wall that the Fourth Amendment created,” Rep. Roy said on the House floor. “The government is not supposed to go through to get into your personal business, get into your homes, to look at your information and to breach the privacy that you’re guaranteed.”
Since then, concerns of espionage and cybersecurity threats from foreign powers like Russia and China have escalated, which Rep. Roy continued to raise concerns about.
“How much spying on American citizens should we allow?” Rep. Roy asked. “Because right now, we know for sure there is warrantless collection of information on the American people.”
