Ted Poe: “I thank the chairman for bringing this bill up and for his work on it in a bipartisan way. I especially want to thank…”

“I thank the chairman for bringing this bill up and for his work on it in a bipartisan way. I especially want to thank Congressman Yoder for pushing this legislation that has overwhelming support in the House of Representatives. Mr. Speaker, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act was passed in 1986--30 years ago. It was an eternity. Understand that IBM invented and put on the market its first laptop in 1986. A lot has changed since that day 30 years ago. As the chairman mentioned, the cloud was where rain came from, or sometimes we see it here in Washington, D.C.--the cloud. No one even knew what that was. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act needs to be fixed because it does not protect the right of privacy of Americans. If something is stored in the cloud that is over 180 days old, then it is open season for government to seize all of that information. All governments--local or State or Federal--can go in and get those emails, texts, photographs, documents that you are storing. Up to 180 days, it is protected by the Constitution. Interesting--180 days of constitutional rights--but on the 181st day, you have no right of privacy. That is absurd. This bill fixes that former legislation. I used to be a judge in Texas for 22 years, and I had peace officers all the time come to see me who wanted a warrant. They followed the Fourth Amendment and described the place to be searched.…”