Political Quotes

“Today, we are voting on a resolution that will bring forward reauthorization of a program that has been abused for decades, the FISA 702 surveillance program. Before we vote on that program, though, this resolution that we are voting on now prescribes that we will bring forward an amendment to require warrants. If you want to spy on Americans, if you want to use this database as a back door to look at the private information of Americans, you would need a warrant if this amendment passes. Now, there are some people who say, oh, getting a warrant is too hard. It will slow us down. You will put America in danger. Listen, I have been in the SCIF, the classified area where they are supposed to tell us the problems with requiring a warrant, and they never have told us a single example of where getting a warrant would be a problem to national security. In fact, we have a provision in the warrant amendment that says in exigent circumstances you can skip that step. You will hear today that everything is fine, that we don't need the warrant amendment, that we have 53 reforms in this package. Here is the problem with those reforms: We rely on the same people who abused the system to enforce those reforms, and they still don't go to the constitutional level that is required in this country. Who doesn't trust those 53 reforms? Congress--the authors of this bill--doesn't trust those 53 reforms. Do you know how I know?…”