ACLU Not Happy With Specter’s NSA Compromise

Posted on June 9, 2006

It looks like things are working themselves out in the Senate for a compromise on the NSA program.

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee has proposed legislation that would give President Bush the option of seeking a warrant from a special court for an electronic surveillance program such as the one being conducted by the National Security Agency.

Sen. Arlen Specter’s approach modifies his earlier position that the NSA eavesdropping program, which targets international telephone calls and e-mails in which one party is suspected of links to terrorists, must be subject to supervision by the secret court set up under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

The new proposal specifies that it cannot “be construed to limit the constitutional authority of the President to gather foreign intelligence information or monitor the activities and communications of any person reasonably believed to be associated with a foreign enemy of the United States.”

Bush has cited his constitutional authority as president as justification for undertaking the warrantless NSA surveillance. The White House and Vice President Cheney have said up to now that no additional legislation is necessary to bring the program within the law.

Specter’s bill, introduced yesterday at a committee meeting, was a compromise worked out with Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) and designed to gather enough Republican support so it can be taken to the floor for a vote. During a conversation with Cheney yesterday afternoon first disclosed by an administration official, Specter (R-Pa.) said he arranged to have Justice Department officials begin reviewing his proposal.

Another part of the Specter bill would grant blanket amnesty to anyone who authorized warrantless surveillance under presidential authority, a provision that seems to ensure that no one would be held criminally liable if the current program is found illegal under present law.

A third provision would consolidate the 29 cases that have been filed in various federal district courts challenging the legality of the NSA program and give jurisdiction over them to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review, which was established by FISA. Any decision of that court would be subject to Supreme Court review and otherwise would be binding on all other courts.

Of course, the ACLU are not happy. They are calling it a blank check given to the president. Since it makes sense to most Americans, and it goes along with the best interest of national security, the ACLU don’t care for it. They were the ones calling for the Senate to review things, now they don’t like what the result was. What a bunch of whiners.

» Filed Under ACLU, News, War On Terror

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6 Responses to “ACLU Not Happy With Specter’s NSA Compromise”

jimmy on June 9th, 2006 11:33 pm

Oh come on. Disagreement is valid on many levels surrounding the constitutionality of the NSA program in question, and indeed debate should take place, but how can you possibly give criticism to resistance of this kind of brazen preemptive amnesty?

Is it constitutional? I don’t know. Is it illegal? I don’t know. This legislation does nothing tangible to answer those important questions. What this legislation does is short-circuit the legitimate and proper judicial and congressional oversight of the executive branch. Something, by the way, that congress may not even have the authority to do. There’s another legitimate debate to be had as to whether or not congress even has the authority to override judicial authority when and if an investigation ever takes place.

Really, though, this legislation won’t ultimately change that authority if it comes down to it, making the amnesty clause of this legislation most likely moot. That leaves us, in effect, with legislation which provides the “option” of consulting FISA to the executive, an option which was obviously already available since it occupies the core of the accusations against the executive to begin with.

Having said nothing partisan there, what the heck is the point of the legislation to begin with? Why bother pointlessly posturing against the ACLU where both sides of the argument about this legislation are so obviously Kabuki?
kerwin_brown on June 10th, 2006 2:35 am

Some of the NSA wiretapping is constitutional as what the government does outside the jurisdiction of the United States is a foreign affairs issue and not a constitutional issue. If you are not an American citizen you have very few protections under the U.S. Constitution as it states clearly that is to insure the blessings of ourselves and our posterity. The only two I know of are equal protection under the law and due process of law and neither cover this situation unless you interpret them broadly.

Congress does have the duty to regulate both the judicial and executive branch though they do not have the right to do the other branches unique job.

All branches of government have the duty to balance our security against our liberties and I don’t have enough information to double guess them on this one.
Jay on June 10th, 2006 7:43 am

Hey Jimmy, thank you for actually bringing in real debate without a bunch of name calling. Perhaps you can stick around and lead a few of our moonbat commenters by example. Anyway I appreciate real debate. We have one here that the only thing they know how to do is insult, or call me a liar. It is refreshing that someone is offering debate without all the venom. Thanks, Jay
Jay on June 10th, 2006 7:47 am

Jimmy, I have shown here many times that the ACLU have already condemned the NSA program as illegal before any kind of investigation. They called for an investigation into the “illegal actions” of the President. It isn’t about disagreement, I just think its funny that they are the ones that screamed for an investigation and now they are crying it didn’t come to the conclusion that they wished for.
jimmy on June 11th, 2006 10:46 pm

Kerwin_brown:
Absolutely foreign only tapping is legal and I’m not sure there’s any dispute about that. The issue here is foreign-domestic tapping which gives at least one party full constitutional protection. That is, can the FBI come into your house without a warrant because foreigners are over for a dinner party? Not perfect, but a fairly reasonable comparison. As for the domestic-domestic profiling, that’s even more ambiguous. Every time a left-winger calls that wire tapping it boils my blood because it’s a massive distortion as profiling is NOT tapping and all it does is make the argument look disingenuous. That said, profiling still very likely is … of ambiguous legality and so there are still questions to be asked and ideally, answered.

As for the congressional authority, I would imagine that the congress bestowed immunity may hold for members of the executive, but I seriously doubt that congress has the authority to grant itself immunity which is implied in the legislation. Think about the implications of congressmen being allowed to legislation themselves immunity. That’s just terrifying.

Jay (The First):
I appreciate the sentiment. One of the most infuriating facets of politics today is the mindless mudslinging. I mean, I appreciate satirical hyperbole (and use it an awful lot myself) but we all know that isn’t what people intend most of the time, on both sides of the “debate”. I’ve been uber-busy with non political stuff and will be for the near future, but rest assured I’ll be around in the future to be the very best thorn in everyone’s side I can be.

Jay (The Second):
All I can say is that what happened was NOT an investigation. When not a single party is questioned under subpoena, and the most relevant parties haven’t even answered questions outside of a subpoena, I have a really, really hard time calling the proceedings an ‘investigation’. That’s what we call kangaroo court.
kerwin_brown on June 12th, 2006 11:55 am

Jimmy,

My argument is no matter where either end of the call is as long as the wiretapping is done outside of where our courts or our legislative have the right to rule, that the wiretapping is legal as far as our law goes. It may not be according to someone else’s law.

Congress always has the right to legislate the internal workings of our government agencies no matter where they are and our courts can judge according to that legislation.

Congress has in the past made themselves exempt from the laws they have passed. I have not heard anything about it lately but I assume it is still happening. It is constitutional since they need to be able to allow certain organizations, such as internet blogs, to be exempt from some legislation but it is I find it unethical to exempt themselves.

I am not sure if they can constitutionally grant amnesty as I am pretty sure that is an executive power.