Arlen Specter Plans Bill To Speed Dictatorship

ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION - Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter said today that he has negotiated a proposed bill with the White House regarding the NSA's illegal spying program. While the final bill is not public, a draft of the bill obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation is a sham compromise that would cut off meaningful legal review -- sweeping current legal challenges out of the traditional court system and failing to require court review or congressional oversight of any future surveillance programs.

"This so-called compromise bill is not a concession from the White House -- it's a rubber stamp for any future spying program dreamed up by the executive," said EFF Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston. "In essence, this bill threatens to make court oversight of electronic surveillance voluntary rather than mandatory."

Although the bill creates a process for the executive branch to seek court review of its secret surveillance programs, it doesn't actually require the government to do so. The bill would, however, require that any lawsuit challenging the legality of any classified surveillance program -- including EFF's class-action suit against AT&T -- be transferred, at the government's request, to the FISA Court of Review, a secret court with no procedures for hearing argument from anyone but the government. The bill would further allow the government to prevent the court from disclosing any information about the government's surveillance programs to opposing counsel, regardless of the court's strict security procedures. "When the privacy of millions of Americans is at stake, we deserve more than a closed hearing by a secret court," said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Lee Tien.

http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2006_07.php#004824

FREE PRESS - The legislation wouldn't actually require the president to submit the National Security Agency's electronic surveillance of phone calls to court review. Instead, Bush agreed to submit the program one time for court review if Congress enacts the bill as it is. There would be no ongoing oversight, Specter said, and future presidents wouldn't have to submit any future program for review.

The court wouldn't have to make its findings public. If the government kept tabs on people it shouldn't have been monitoring, that could stay secret.

The bill also would give the administration more surveillance tools, including expanding the amount of time the government can conduct wiretaps without a warrant from three days to seven days. It would further authorize roving wiretaps that follow individuals from device to device, Specter said.

In addition, the Associated Press reported that an administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the bill would give the attorney general power to consolidate 100 lawsuits filed against the surveillance operations into one case before the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

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