FBI director makes plea for 702 reauthorization without a warrant requirement FBI Director Christopher Wray at a Tuesday hearing gave an impassioned pitch for Congress to reauthorize warrantless surveillance powers for the intelligence community without the need to secure a court’s blessing to review information on Americans swept up in the process.
Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is set to expire at the end of the year unless it is reauthorized by Congress, threatening to topple a program that allows the U.S. government to monitor the communications of foreign nationals located abroad.
“702 is key to our ability to detect a foreign terrorist organization overseas directing an operative here to carry out an attack in our own backyard,” Wray said in testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee.
“And U.S. person queries in particular may provide the critical link that allows us to identify the intended target or build out the network of attackers so we can stop them before they strike and kill Americans,” Wray said.In an effort to curb the intelligence community’s ability to access communications of Americans speaking with those being surveilled, some congressional proposals would require the government to first get a warrant.
It’s something that has been called a red line by the intelligence community and an idea that Wray said would hinder the FBI from acting in real time, including by taking steps to notify Americans who may be the target of attacks.
“Many of those crucial victim notifications were made possible by our ability to conduct U.S. person queries of our existing 702 collection,” Wray said.
Congress is weighing competing plans for how to reauthorize the law, but of the committee-backed bills, only a proposal from the House Judiciary Committee would require the intelligence community to seek a warrant before reviewing information gathered on Americans through Section 702...................
https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/4343634-fbi-director-makes-plea-for-702-reauthorization/
