Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I came to the floor several days ago in connection with the expiring national security provisions. We have three provisions of our national security system of laws that are set to expire and have been set to expire for a long time. In fact, they expired yesterday, the 15th of March. We have known that this was going to happen for a long time. When the USA FREEDOM Act was passed in 2015--a bill that I authored, along with my distinguished friend and colleague Senator Leahy from Vermont--we knew those three provisions known as lone wolf, 215, and roving wire taps would expire at the end of 2019. We got to the end of 2019, and we found ourselves up against a spending cliff, and the Senate decided, with the concurrence of the House of Representatives and the President, that we should postpone until March 15 the expiration of those three provisions that I just mentioned. I came to the floor on Thursday to raise concerns that we needed to be able to amend and reform these provisions of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, for a number of reasons. Among other reasons, I noted that the President of the United States found that his own rights as an American citizen were abused, as this law was manipulated, was abused in an unholy alliance of partisan political interests against him. For that reason, the President of the United States has, quite thankfully, made this point clear to the American people.…”