Representative Heather Wilson: “I think my colleague from Pennsylvania raises a good point. What are the protections for America's civil liberties, and…”

“I think my colleague from Pennsylvania raises a good point. What are the protections for America's civil liberties, and there has been a lot of misinformation out there about the protections in the Protect America Act for American civil liberties. In fact, in the Senate bill that we would like to have a vote on here in the House, the civil liberties protections for Americans are more than exist under current law, under the current FISA law. What are those protections? First, you have to have a warrant to target anyone in the United States, American or foreigner. So you must have a warrant if someone is reasonably believed to be in the United States. It is a felony to do what some have called reverse targeting. In other words, you think somebody may be affiliated with a terrorist group. They are in the United States and they have a brother in Lebanon. So gee, let's wiretap their brother in Lebanon and maybe we can pick up some of their conversations back to the guy in the United States. That is a felony. You can't do that. You have to have a warrant if your target is reasonably believed to be in the United States, and you cannot do reverse targeting. It also extends the protection of the Constitution to Americans traveling overseas. This is something that doesn't exist in current law.”