Section 702 expires at the end of the year, and Congress is considering whether to reauthorize it and weighing how to reform — or nix — the law.
The common theme among the expert witnesses testifying on Friday was that the current system is broken and must be overhauled.
“If we reauthorize Section 702 without significant changes, then we become a nation of chumps,” said Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University and Fox News contributor. “We have documented evidence of massive violations of the privacy of U.S. citizens.”
According to fellow witness Elizabeth Goitein of the Brennan Center for Justice, the scale of surveillance on U.S. citizens is mind-numbing.
“Americans' communications are swept up in enormous volumes — so enormous that the government won't tell us how big it is,” said Goitein, who added in her written testimony that the number of communications is likely in the millions. “And those communications are available to FBI agents without a warrant or a court order of any kind.”