July, 21 2023, 06:04pm EDT
Government Releases New Court Opinions Highlighting Further Abuse of Warrantless FISA Surveillance Program
ACLU condemns use of Section 702 for warrantless spying on Americans, immigrants, and public officials; Calls on Congress to fundamentally reform the law
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) today released two heavily redacted court opinions that address spying conducted by the FBI, NSA, and CIA under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Issued by the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), the opinions describe numerous recent violations of legal requirements and court-ordered rules intended to protect Americans’ privacy — including the use of Section 702 to surveil a sitting state court judge who “had complained to [the] FBI about alleged civil rights violations perpetrated by a municipal chief of police.”
These opinions also reveal multiple instances of FBI agents searching the agency’s enormous Section 702 databases for information about people who are not suspected of any wrongdoing. As the FISC described, FBI field offices repeatedly engaged in prohibited searches, including as part of criminal investigations without a foreign nexus, investigations into the Jan. 6, 2021 breach of the U.S. Capitol, and vetting of sources and Afghan refugees.
“These disturbing new revelations show how Section 702 surveillance, a spy program the government claims is focused on foreign adversaries, is routinely used against Americans, immigrants, and people who are not accused of any wrongdoing,” said Patrick Toomey, deputy director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project. “The FBI continues to break the rules put in place to protect Americans, running illegal searches on public officials including a U.S. senator, and it’s long past time for Congress to step in. As Congress debates reauthorizing Section 702, these opinions make clear why fundamental reforms are urgently needed.”
Significantly, one of the opinions released today describes a completely new use of Section 702 surveillance by the NSA: to conduct routine, suspicionless searches of people overseas who are applying for immigration benefits or seeking to travel to the United States. As the FISC acknowledged, these suspicionless queries are unprecedented under Section 702, and this novel use of the spy program for immigration and travel purposes will impact the privacy of Americans who are in contact with people seeking to come to the United States. The NSA’s use of warrantless FISA surveillance to vet immigrants and travelers is a dramatic expansion of Section 702 never authorized by Congress.
One of the opinions was released today in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit the ACLU filed in February 2023, and the other is the subject of a FOIA request the ACLU submitted in June 2023. Over the past two decades, the FISC has issued many secret legal opinions authorizing the U.S. government to conduct sweeping programs of electronic surveillance. The court’s opinions have a profound impact on Americans’ rights to privacy, free expression, and free association, and they often remain entirely hidden from public view for years — unless an organization like the ACLU sues.
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
(212) 549-2666LATEST NEWS
Bondi Shreds Biden-Era Protections for Journalists as Trump White House Hunts Leakers
One critic warned that President Donald Trump "almost certainly will abuse the legal system to investigate and prosecute his critics and the journalists they talk to."
Apr 28, 2025
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has scrapped a Biden-era policy that sharply restricted the Justice Department's ability to seize journalists' records and force them to testify in leak investigations, an alarming move that press freedom advocates said carries dire implications for reporters and whistleblowers.
In an internal memo first reported Friday by CBS News, Bondi wrote that the Justice Department "will not tolerate unauthorized disclosures that undermine President [Donald] Trump's policies, victimize government agencies, and cause harm to the American people."
"The perpetrators of these leaks aid our foreign adversaries by spilling sensitive and sometimes classified information onto the Internet. The damage is significant and irreversible," Bondi continued. "Accountability, including criminal prosecutions, is necessary to set a new course."
As part of a renewed crackdown on leaks, Bondi said she is issuing revised Justice Department regulations stating that media outlets "must answer subpoenas" related to efforts to uncover sources of unauthorized disclosures within the federal government.
"The policy contemplates the use of subpoenas, court orders, and search warrants to compel production of information and testimony by and relating to members of the news media, subject to the Privacy Protection Act, 42 U.S.C. § 2000aa, and the approval of the department's leadership in some instances," the memo states. "The attorney general must also approve efforts to question or arrest members of the news media."
"Some of the most consequential reporting in U.S. history—from Watergate to warrantless wiretapping after 9/11—was and continues to be made possible because reporters have been able to protect the identities of confidential sources."
The Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF)—a group co-founded by the late Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked classified documents that came to be known as the Pentagon Papers—noted in a statement that Bondi's memo followed "news that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard asked the Department of Justice to investigate recent leaks to reporters."
Seth Stern, FPF's advocacy director, said Bondi's move was made possible by lawmakers' failure to pass the PRESS Act, bipartisan legislation would have codified into law rules prohibiting the federal government from forcing journalists or telecom companies from disclosing information about their sources.
"Every Democrat who put the PRESS Act on the back burner when they had the opportunity to pass a bipartisan bill codifying journalist-source confidentiality should be ashamed," said Stern. "Everyone predicted this would happen in a second Trump administration, yet politicians in a position to prevent it prioritized empty rhetoric over putting up a meaningful fight."
"Because of them," Stern added, "a president who threatens journalists with prison rape for protecting their sources and says reporting critically on his administration should be illegal can and almost certainly will abuse the legal system to investigate and prosecute his critics and the journalists they talk to."
After his victory in the 2024 presidential election, Trump instructed Republicans to block the PRESS Act, writing on his social media platform, "REPUBLICANS MUST KILL THIS BILL!"
Since the start of his second term, Trump has launched what Reporters Without Borders (RSF) characterized as "a monumental assault on press freedom," including by engaging in "legal intimidation" against media outlets.
"When you step back and look at the whole picture, the pattern of blows to press freedom is quite clear," Clayton Weimers, executive director of RSF North America, said late last week. "RSF refuses to accept this massive attack on press freedom as the new normal. We will continue to call out these assaults against the press and use every means at our disposal to fight back against them. We urge every American who values press freedom to do the same."
Earlier this month, the Committee to Protect Journalists issued a safety advisory to journalists planning to visit the United States, warning "journalists who are at high risk of being detained at the border" to "consider leaving their personal and/or work devices at home and instead carry separate devices and a new SIM card."
Bruce Brown, president of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said in a statement following Bondi's memo that "strong protections for journalists serve the American public by safeguarding the free flow of information."
"Some of the most consequential reporting in U.S. history—from Watergate to warrantless wiretapping after 9/11—was and continues to be made possible because reporters have been able to protect the identities of confidential sources and uncover and report stories that matter to people across the political spectrum," Brown said.
Keep ReadingShow Less
GOP Unveils Plan to Give $150 Billion More to Pentagon
"Any additional money pumped into this system is likely to be wasted," said one analyst. "The only beneficiaries will be weapons contractors."
Apr 28, 2025
Congressional Republicans on Sunday released legislation that would pump an additional $150 billion into the Pentagon—a morass of waste and profiteering—over the next decade as part of a sweeping reconciliation package that's also expected to include deep cuts to Medicaid and tax breaks for the wealthy.
The House Armed Services Committee, a major target of weapons industry lobbying, unveiled the plan for what it called "a historic investment of $150 billion to restore America's military capabilities and strengthen our national defense." The panel said the legislation was developed "in close conjunction" with Senate Republicans and President Donald Trump, who is separately pursuing a $1 trillion U.S. military budget for the next fiscal year.
The legislation would direct the new Pentagon funding toward a number of initiatives backed by the president, including a "Golden Dome" missile defense system that experts have called a massive boondoggle that could benefit Elon Musk.
The bill, which is scheduled for a committee markup on Tuesday, also includes $4.5 billion to speed production of the B-21 stealth bomber, a Northrop Grumman-made aircraft capable of delivering nuclear weapons.
William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, said Sunday that the GOP's proposed Pentagon spending increase is "a glaring example of misplaced priorities."
"This is no time to throw more money at a weapons manufacturing base that is already maxed out," said Hartung. "Any additional money pumped into this system is likely to be wasted. The only beneficiaries will be weapons contractors, who will be glad to accept the new funds whether they can use them effectively or not."
"Given that the Pentagon and its contractor network are having a hard time spending existing funds well," Hartung added, "Congress should think twice before sending more taxpayer money their way."
The Republican push for additional Pentagon funding comes as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is facing calls to resign for sharing plans for a U.S. military attack on Yemen in at least two private group chats.
Earlier this month, as Common Dreamsreported, Hegseth endorsed Trump's push for a $1 trillion U.S. military budget, which would mark the highest level of spending since the Second World War.
Keep ReadingShow Less
100 Palestinians Killed in Weekend of Israeli Airstrikes on Gaza
Victims include 22 members of one family massacred in their Gaza City home.
Apr 27, 2025
Israel Defense Forces bombing killed at least 100 Palestinians including numerous women and children in the Gaza Strip over the weekend, while the IDF also renewed airstrikes on Lebanon as cease-fire talks between senior Hamas and Egyptian officials wrapped up in Cairo without any breakthrough.
The Gaza Health Ministry said Sunday that Israeli strikes killed at least 51 Palestinians over the previous 24 hours. Among the victims were eight people, including three women and two children, killed in an IDF bombing of a tent in Khan Younis; a man and four children slain in another strike on a tent in Deir al-Balah; and at least six people who died when a coffee shop near the Bureij refugee camp was hit.
The ministry said Saturday that at least 49 Palestinians were killed during the preceding 24 hours, including 22 members of the al-Khour family who were sheltering in their Gaza City home when it was bombed.
The IDF said the strike targeted a Hamas militant. Israel's military relaxed rules of engagement after the October 7, 2023 attack to allow an unlimited number of civilians to be killed when targeting a single Hamas member, no matter how low-ranking.
Saed al-Khour, who is grieving the loss of his family, refuted Israel's claim, tellingThe Associated Press that "there is no one from the resistance" among the victims.
"We have been pulling out the remains of children, women, and elderly people," al-Khour added.
Israel's U.S.-backed 569-day assault on Gaza has left at least 183,800 Palestinians dead, injured, or missing. Nearly all of Gaza's more than 2 million people have been forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened amid a "complete siege" that is cited in an International Court of Justice genocide case against Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant are also fugitives from the International Criminal Court, which issued arrest warrants for the pair last year.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces unleashed a wave of bombing attacks in Lebanon in what critics called a blatant violation of a November cease-fire agreement with the resistance group Hezbollah. The IDF bombed targets in southern Lebanon and in suburbs of the capital city of Beirut.
The IDF, which said it warned residents ahead of the Beirut airstrike, claimed it attacked "an infrastructure where precision missiles" were being stored by Hezbollah, without providing any supporting evidence.
Israel says it will continue its assault and siege on Gaza until Hamas releases the two dozen Israeli and other hostages it has imprisoned since October 2023. Hamas counters that it will only free the hostages in an exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, a complete withdrawal of IDF troops from Gaza, and a new cease-fire agreement. Israel unilaterally broke a January cease-fire last month.
A senior Hamas delegation left Cairo late Saturday following days of talks regarding a possible deal for a multi-year truce and the release of all remaining hostages. The head of Israel's Mossad spy agency was also in Qatar earlier this week for separate cease-fire talks. Qatari mediators said they believed there has been "some progress" in both sides' willingness to reach an agreement.
United Nations agencies and international humanitarian groups—many of which have accused Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war—have warned in recent days of the imminent risk of renewed famine in Gaza as food stocks run out.
"Children in Gaza are starving," the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East
said on social media Sunday. "The government of Israel continues to block the entry of food and other basics. [This is a] man-made and politically motivated starvation."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular