Demand Progress

A bipartisan group of Senators on the Senate Intelligence Committee approved measures to protect Americans from government wiretaps and broader spying powers. BUT some Republican senators are trying to stop these reforms from making it into a must-pass piece of legislation.¹

Congress has already allowed America’s indiscriminate mass surveillance to expand this year. The Senate cannot fail to pass these new proposed safeguards aimed at protecting the privacy of millions of Americans.

Sign the petition: Urge your U.S. Senators to save critical protections against government surveillance!

Earlier this year, Congress passed surveillance legislation that vastly increases the number of Americans whose communications networks can be wiretapped.² Even more disturbing, the law currently lets agencies secretly force millions of Americans to spy on others. The bipartisan reforms that some GOP senators are trying to stop would seriously rein in the worst kinds of this warrantless government spying.

Even before Congress expanded mass surveillance earlier this year, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) was being abused by the government to spy on Americans by collecting and searching through international communications without a warrant. If Congress fails to pass the bipartisan privacy reforms currently included in this year’s Intelligence Authorization Act, the out-of-control surveillance state run by the CIA, NSA, and FBI will be terrifyingly prone to abuse and continue on with very few checks from our elected officials.

Sign the petition: Urge your U.S. Senators to stand against warrantless wiretapping!

Sources:

1. Wired, “US Senators Secretly Work to Block Safeguards Against Surveillance Abuse,” July 15, 2024.
2. Ibid.