The Record: New plan would give Congress another 18 months to revisit Section 702 surveillance powers 

“A clean refresh of FISA Section 702 would show utter disrespect for the American people,” according to Jeramie D. Scott, senior counsel and director of the Project on Surveillance Oversight at the Electronic Privacy Information Center. 

“We don’t need a reform commission to tell us that Section 702 authority, a foreign intelligence authority, has been abused to access Americans’ communications,” he said in a statement. “It’s well documented and so is one of the most straightforward solutions—a warrant requirement to search Americans’ communications incidentally collected through Section 702 surveillance.” 

A commission “could be helpful in further analyzing what additional reforms are needed or assessing the effectiveness of new reforms, but let’s not act like we don’t know what some of the main problems are and the potential solutions. Congress needs to do its job,” Scott said. 

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