Trump Loyalists Kill Vote on US Wiretap Program

The Nexus of Privacy@lemmy.sdf.org to politics @lemmy.world – 141 points – Trump Loyalists Kill Vote on US Wiretap Program
wired.com

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/15183880

Well it wasn't just Trump loyalists; it was 19 Republicans in the Freedom Caucus (who are indeed Trump loyalists) and almost all the Democrats voting agains bringing the current bill to the floor. Now what?

"Congressional sources tell WIRED they have no idea what the next steps will be."

Oh.

24

It's obvious he doesn't want to be caught in the act of selling all the 'missing' classified docs he's still hiding

And the rest of his traitorous collaborations

I don't care how much dirt FISA could enable us to dig up on Trump, the trade isn't worth it. It'd be the epitome of biting off your nose to spite your face

I don't think anyone needs more evidence that Trump is a crook; I think the concern is that Trump is enough in cahoots with for-real foreign adversaries who are at odds with FISA-authorized surveillance (as it makes real operational problems for them), and they might be telling him how badly he needs to kill this to weaken it. He usually doesn't get anywhere deep into policy on this kind of stuff. Unless someone smarter than him is telling him what's important, he just talks about windmills and toilets and Crooked Hillary and how the election was stolen.

I honestly don't know whether it's that, or whether he's having an unexpected interest in policy details just because it came to his attention somehow and he knows the US national security apparatus is bad because it was mean to him. It could be either one.

"Cool story. Still murder." I have really serious problems with how FISA has been used in the past. I usually could go either way on authorizing state surveillance but it has been abused too much for me to be comfortable keeping it around in its current form

As far as trump is concerned, even a broken clock is right twice a day

Yeah. And it could be both -- it could be both a useful tool for law enforcement to wiretap foreign adversaries that are trying to elect Trump or do something similarly awful, and also a convenient loophole if they want to track protest organizations where one of the members sometimes calls his brother who lives in France or whatever. Russia/Trump would only care about the first, and someone who's chiefly concerned about civil liberties in the US would only really care (or even be aware of, by definition) about the second.

I didn't like the patriot act and this seems like a loophole to doing patriot act things. It needs to apply to foreign protections and not citizens. Never thought id say it, but I have to agree with magas On this one. Most likely the magas don't appreciate the law spying on them and don't. care about the citizens.

I have never been so conflicted about a news story

Like hey hooray, congress did something good!

Wait

Wait

Did they?

The framing of it is odd when it was just 19 Republicans making up the 228 no votes largely by Democrats. I get that they were probably just motivated by Trump’s social media ramblings but it seems like this was a Democrat win for privacy rights.

The Worst Person You Know Just Made A Great Point

I don't think that applies here.

The democrats oppose this spy tool because it is badly regulated and prone to abuse.
The Trump loyalists oppose this spy tool because it may expose some of Trumps crimes and treason.

They did -- FISA shouldn't be extended without reforms. All the scare tactics about how "oh noes national security is at risk if FISA isn't extended!!!!" are garbage; if Section 702 lapses, existing certifications are already approved for the next year, and the government has other authorities it can do the same kind of surveillance with.

As Howie Klein says on Down With Tyranny FISA Was Always Bad Legislation... It's Still Bad Even If Trump And MAGA Suddenly Oppose It Too

One of the few actions coming from Trump and his band of cock suckers.

Fuck domestic spy programs. Fuck FISA.

Tear all of it down.

Hey, no need to disparage cock suckers by equating them with Trump and his loyalists. Being a cock sucker shouldn’t be an insult.

I guess I don't understand the vitriol here. This is spying on foreign nationals who have dealings with citizens. Are we under the impression that Trump is the only traitor? Because it looks to me like even with FISA we have a fuck load of foreign agents in our country including politicians, military folks like General Flynn, Giuliani, Kushner - and that's only Trump's orbit.

There are clearly massive intelligence operations penetrating the country successfully. I don't want to be a puppet of a fascist foreign government any more than I want to be controlled by a fascist domestic one. I'm a hell of a lot more scared of that than FISA, but maybe there's an angle I'm missing. Any problem I have with FISA begins with the fact that it is clearly an utter failure. If you're going to spy on folks, prosecute the fucking bad guys. Someone want to explain their point of view or is this just something I'm out of sync with the left on?

Absolutely the right thing, but for the wrong reason of course.

I’ll still celebrate this win - warrantless wiretapping is not ok, never was, and I’m glad if this results in FISA being put to rest.

I hope Fat Fuck thinks this stops them watching what he's doing lol.

  1. He's under indictment, so they are watching his every movement

  2. This act was only the thin law flavored covering over what our spy agencies do.

Dont get me wrong, Im glad it got shot down, but they absolutely are and still will be watching what everyone is doing, especially in regards to our adversaries.

Yeah, all the scare tactics about how "oh noes national security is at risk if FISA isn't extended!!!!" are garbage; if Section 702 lapses, existing certifications are already approved for the next year, and the government has other authorities it can do the same kind of surveillance with. And the surveillance he's complaining about wasn't even under this section of FISA -- it's the Title III stuff which doesn't need to be reauthorized!

As Howie Klein says on Down With Tyranny FISA Was Always Bad Legislation... It's Still Bad Even If Trump And MAGA Suddenly Oppose It Too

Spying on our own citizens is unconstitutional (illegal search).

However, everything a public official does or says should be considered public record and a basic requirement for holding office.

They ask what will happen next. My guess is... nothing changes, someone in the future whistleblows, and 'kills themselves' with a double tap to the back of the head. It's a toss up whether the public will ever know of the whole ordeal.

Godammit. I can only through my support and effort behind only so many issues. Things I thought we had won come back around over and over. This country has gone to an authoritarian shithole