Political Quotes

“concern was raised during the consideration of this bill by several folks who were concerned about first amendment rights. It was a drafting point, but it needed to be fixed in order to make it perfectly clear. We do not want to make it a crime to divulge or publish information that someone does not know came from an intercepted cell call. That would criminalize unintentional acts. Mr. Chairman, say a reporter gets a scoop from a source, not knowing that it came from an intercepted call, for example. We do not want that to be a crime, even if the interception is a crime. But we do wish to prohibit people divulging information that they know was illegally intercepted, even if they were not the ones that actually intercepted the call. If we did not do that, that would be a loophole to drive a truck through. How could that happen? Let us say I am illegally monitoring cell calls, whether for pleasure or just systematically, and I intercept a cell call of a builder who is talking over his phone who talks about information on a bid that he is going to give on a job. I give it to my buddy, and my buddy divulges it to another builder or divulges it publicly. It should be a crime to divulge that information if one knows that it came from an intercepted call. It should be a crime for me to do it or for my buddy to do it, if he knows that I have been scanning those calls. This amendment makes that clarification, that it is a crime to intentionally intercept.…”