Trade is vital to our economic engine, creating jobs and lifting wages here at home.

The role of Congress is to protect and defend the United States Constitution and personal liberties provided to American citizens under the Fourth Amendment.

Just because it can be done doesn't mean it necessarily should be done.

the court ruled unanimously that physically attaching a GPS device to a vehicle constituted the search under the Fourth Amendment.

I recently introduced the Geolocational Privacy and Surveillance Act.

The bill creates a legal framework designed to give government agencies, commercial entities and private citizens clear guidelines for when and how geolocation information can be accessed and used.

As Congressman Chaffetz has already pointed out, passing the GPS Act would fulfill Congress's duty to ensure that the safeguards provided by the Fourth Amendment of our Constitution are respected.

There is a need to be consistent, you would agree with that? And would you also agree that there is great inconsistency?

I thank you Mr. Chairman. And thank you to all the witnesses, I appreciate your perspective and the passion you bring behind those perspectives.

Representative Goodlatte and Chaffetz's GPS Act is an important step toward closing the 21st century loophole in ECPA.

What I am also worried about is somebody tracking and following somebody else in a surreptitious manner.

To say that the technology is not pervasive would be inaccurate, it is very pervasive and can be helpful in many ways, but it can also be confusing as we try to find and test the limits of where privacy starts, where it ends, and what law…

Mr. Gowdy. Jason Chaffetz and Chairman Goodlatte are two of the most reasonable people in Congress.

The District of Columbia is not a colony, it is part of the United States, and its people are entitled to be treated with the same respect that we demand for the people we represent.

The only way you change behavior more than that is when you put somebody in jail. That really is a game changer.

I just see a real lack of accountability and prosecution.

I think when we have consent decrees where nobody admits any guilt and they only pay a relatively minor fine, that it will not change bad behavior.

So in that case, you have actually done much of the research for--if there was some private right of action, you have actually done much of the work for it.