Patriot Act

Leahy, Paul Team Up To Stop Provisions Of The PATRIOT Act

Ryan J. Reilly | May 23, 2011, 5:05PM

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Rand Paul (R-KY) are teaming up to introduce an amendment to the PATRIOT Act that would phase out some of the most controversial components of the national security law.

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Patriot Act

Patriot Act Extension Passes On Simple Majority Vote

Ryan J. Reilly | February 14, 2011, 7:13PM

An extension of several provisions of the PATRIOT Act, which failed to pass the House last week under a procedural motion which required a two-thirds super-majority, passed on Monday night under a simple majority vote.

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Patriot Act

Tea Partiers Help ACLU, House Dems Stop Patriot Act Renewal

Susan Crabtree and Ryan J. Reilly | February 9, 2011, 9:27AM

Reps. Ron Paul (R-TX) and Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)

The American Civil Liberties Union's Michelle Richardson didn't know where things stood ahead of the House's vote expended certain provisions of the PATRIOT Act last night.

"I have no special inside knowledge on how this is going to shake down, but we're certainly going to be watching it closely," she told TPM ahead of the Tuesday night vote.

The big mystery was how the Tea Party-backed members would break on the first national security vote in the new Congress -- and whether the libertarian leanings of members from the right could align with concerns about government overreach on the left. Richardson said they'd be "seeing if the small government beliefs that have been espoused also apply in the national security context."

In the end, 26 Republicans broke with their leadership to oppose the bill, which still gained a majority of votes (227 to 148) but didn't pass.

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DOJ

DOJ Watchdog Investigating The Abuse Of Muslim Federal Inmates

Ryan J. Reilly | February 8, 2011, 11:40AM

The Justice Department's Inspector General is investigating two incidents involving Bureau of Prisons employees who allegedly abused federal prisoners who were Muslim in the second half of 2010 due to their choice of religion -- and has referred 16 other incidents to BOP for further investigation.

Between July 1 and Dec. 31 of last year, the Inspector General processed 1,293 new civil rights or civil liberties complaints and found 1,072 of them did not fall within the OIG's jurisdiction or did not warrant further investigation. Most of the incidents they did examine in the report revolve around the alleged abuse of Muslim prisoners.

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Surveillance

Leahy Intros Patriot Act Bill With Some Restrictions; ACLU Says Not Enough

Rachel Slajda | January 27, 2011, 12:17PM

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT)

Following on the heels of a House Republican's alteration-free one-year extension of the expiring Patriot Act provisions, Sen. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has introduced his own extension that would add some restrictions to the so-called library provision.

That's great, says the ACLU. But it's not enough.

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Civil liberties

Patriot Act's Wiretapping, FISA Provisions Quietly Come Up For Renewal

Rachel Slajda | January 25, 2011, 8:48AM

From a Patriot Act protest in 2005.

At the end of next month, two of the Patriot Act's controversial provisions -- one authorizing "roving" wiretapping and one allowing the government to pull all sorts of records and electronic communications from U.S. citizens -- will expire.

Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI), the new chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, has already introduced legislation that would simply extend the provisions for one more year.

That would essentially be a repeat of what happened a year ago, after the provisions expired in December 2009. There was a bit of a fight from civil liberties advocates, but the measures were renewed for another year at the end of last February.

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Surveillance

Colbert On GPS Story: Sprint Can't Replace Patriot Act On Its Own (VIDEO)

Justin Elliott | December 17, 2009, 1:21PM

Stephen Colbert

Stephen Colbert tackled the cellphone surveillance story we've been telling you about last night, riffing on corporate America's growing role in police surveillance.

"There's a good chance Congress wont reauthorize the Patriot Act," says Colbert. "Luckily, someone out there is willing to step in: America's corporations."

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Michael Brown

Michael Brown To Teach Class On Patriot Act

Zachary Roth | December 4, 2009, 3:10PM

Michael Brown

Heckuva seminar, Brownie!

Michael Brown, the much-ridiculed former FEMA director who became a symbol of the Bush administration's disastrous response to Hurricane Katrina, has landed a new gig: teaching a law-school class on the Patriot Act next spring.

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Steve King

Patriot Games: GOP Reps Pick Tea Party Rally Over National-Security Votes

Zachary Roth | November 6, 2009, 12:29PM

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) at the Capitol Hill tea party.

When it's a choice between strengthening the Patriot Act, or showing up for the Tea Party Patriots, what's a GOP lawmaker to do? We'll give you one guess...

Several Republican members of Congress yesterday blew off votes on the signature anti-terror legislation of the post 9/11 era to attend Michele Bachmann's Tea Party rally against health-care reform.

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