Louie Gohmert: “Today in our Judiciary Committee was quite interesting. For some people, it was quite a role reversal. We had a hearing…”

“Today in our Judiciary Committee was quite interesting. For some people, it was quite a role reversal. We had a hearing on the potential reauthorization of the FISA courts and discussion about powers of our DOJ, FBI, and NSA under what is often referred to as section 215. It was interesting in the way of role reversals because, for years, we have been told that Democrats are the real civil libertarians. They are the ones who are trying to defend privacy rights, rights of Americans to think what they want, do what they want, and without being interrupted or spied upon by the Federal Government. Yet, today, over and over, we heard apologies basically from our Democratic friends to the representative of the Department of Justice, the FBI, and National Security Administration for comments of some Republicans. There really was no need to apologize. We weren't attacking these three individual witnesses, but there are issues that are still unresolved that many of my friends across the aisle used to be concerned about, privacy and Fourth Amendment rights that are supposed to protect us from improper search and seizure or spying, or surveillance being one of the more important. So we had these witnesses. It was interesting, and if I were our friend Israel, I would be very concerned, because I asked these representatives, first of all, does the Department of Justice, the FBI, or the NSA consider Russia to be a known terrorist organization under section 215.…”