House rejects bid to curb spy agency data collection
Theres always more to the story:
“Government’s gone too far in the name of security,” said Representative Ted Poe, a Texas Republican. “Rein in government invasion, no more dragnet operations, get a specific warrant based on probable cause or stay out of our lives.”
Representative Joe Barton, another Texas Republican, said the issue was not whether the NSA was sincere or careful in collecting data for use in anti-terrorism operations.
“It is (about) whether they have the right to collect the data in the first place on every phone call on every American every day,” he said, noting that the law only allowed collection of relevant data. “In the NSA’s interpretation of that, relevant is all data, all the time. That’s simply wrong.”
U.S. spy chiefs, the White House and senior lawmakers responsible for overseeing intelligence agencies in Congress had joined ranks against the effort to curb the program.
Representatives Mike Rogers of Michigan and Dutch Ruppersberger of Maryland, the Republican chairman and senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement after the vote that the amendment would have eliminated a “crucial counterterrorism tool.”
Heres what our supposed governing document has to say about unwarranted searches or seizures:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
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