Political Quotes

“I think that is a good question, and the Senator's office and my office have worked for a while to try to come up with FISA reforms. One of them is sort of in the USA FREEDOM Act but maybe could be better, saying that there ought to be a special advocate so there is an adversarial proceeding. One of the problems in the USA FREEDOM Act, as it is written, is that the advocate is only appointed by the FISA Court and doesn't have to be appointed by the FISA Court. It may well be that a FISA Court that has given a rubberstamp to bulk collection may not be as inclined to give a special advocate. I also think it is important, as the Senator mentioned many times, that we should get outside of a secret court to a real court, where you really have an advocate that is actually on your side, I think allowing for an escape hatch for people to appeal. For example, if you are being told by a FISA Court that bulk collection of all the phone data in our country is legal, you should have a route to an appellate court, an automatic route out of FISA to an appellate court. I think the appellate courts are fully capable of redacting, going into closed session if they have to, but then you have a real trial, with a real advocate on both sides. I think that is important as well.…”