Proposed warrantless wiretap legislation
John Conyers (D-MI) and Silvestre Reyes (D-Tex.), chairs of the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees respectively, introduced legislation today to replace the temporary Protect America Act and will permanently revise the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The new bill, the RESTORE Act of 2007 (Responsible Surveillance That is Overseen, Reviewed and Effective), is not as onerous as depicted in the NYT piece this morning, but falls short of fully protecting individual civil liberties. Furthermore the bill does not provide the retroactive immunity the White House and GOP Members of Congress are seeking for the flagrant lawbreaking — warrantless eavesdropping — committed by the Bush administration and major telecom companies.
President Bush has promised to veto any legislation that does not include retroactive immunity.
Bruce Fein, Chairman of American Freedom Agenda and former Deputy Associate Attorney General in the Reagan administration, gave a good summary of the shortcomings of the proposed legislation on Countdown tonight. The video is Keith Olbermann’s interview of Fein.
A summary of the proposed legislation is here (pdf).
