The US House Judiciary Committee’s extraordinary steadfastness in shedding light and making the public aware of the many ways the government censored, surveilled, or otherwise curtailed citizens’ constitutional rights, continues.
In fact, it continues from one administration to another, from the previous Congress to the current one – and just this week, a hearing was organized by the Subcommittee on Crime and Federal Government Surveillance to take a closer look into, “A Continued Pattern of Government Surveillance of US Citizens.”
A key topics of the exchanges that took place between the Subcommittee’s members and witnesses invited to provide testimonies was the nature of warrantless surveillance taking place under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
The law got renewed in 2024 and now requires more US businesses than before to provide access, for warrantless surveillance purposes – to phones, WiFi routers, and other devices.
New York Democrat, Congressman Dan Goldman, who sits on the House Judiciary Committee, decided to try to downplay the impact of warrantless surveillance under Section 702, at once challenging the viewpoint presented by the Committee’s chair, Republican Jim Jordan.
Goldman also took the opportunity to “disagree with some” of the witnesses – which included representatives of the Project for Privacy & Surveillance Accountability, Americans for Prosperity, and American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
Goldman continued to argue that Section 702 is narrowly aimed at warrantless targeting of “foreigners” (whatever that definition means these days, especially to US Democrats.)
However, even one of those non-profits often ideologically aligned with that party – ACLU – offers states on its website that, enabled by FISA’s Section 702, the US government “engages in mass, warrantless surveillance of Americans’ and foreigners’ phone calls, text messages, emails, and other electronic communications.”
Regardless – “Not a broad set of information,” is how Goldman chose to defend the law during the hearing, to then quickly and rather clumsily deflect to what Elon Musk may or may not have access to, as a person participating in the shaping-up of the second Trump administration.
Goldman’s entire presentation overall sought to move along these lines – address every other issue, loosely if at all connected, that might detour from the one at hand – that the committee wished to gain more insight into.
The discussion Goldman seems to have contributed only smoke and mirrors to was defined by the Committee as principally seeking to “examine the government’s abuse of its surveillance authorities, including the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the government’s purchasing of data, and new and emerging technologies like facial recognition.”
