“No American should have to choose between security or freedom. I’ll be voting NO on the reauthorization of Patriot Act/FISA provisions because it fails to protect our civil liberties and 4th Amendment constitutional rights.”

-Tulsi Gabbard

5/27/20

No to re-authorization on

FISA Section 702 Program

#HavanaSyndrome is directly connected to the surveillance and targeting aspect.

House GOP pushes spy powers vote to April, 2026 amid opposition

House Republican leaders will not bring a “clean” reauthorization of foreign surveillance powers up for a vote next week as they had hoped, opposition to the program in both parties prevents swift passage.

House GOP leaders had eyed a vote next week on an 18-month extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which authorizes surveillance of foreign nationals outside the U.S. They hoped to extend it without the reforms long sought by privacy hawks concerned about communications of Americans that can be swept up in the surveillance. The FISA authorities expire April 20. Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) had wanted to vote on FISA before a scheduled two-week recess in early April to give the Senate plenty of time to process the legislation.

While FISA reauthorization is historically bipartisan, House GOP leaders are in a tough spot. clean FISA extension has opposition from enough members in the super-slim GOP majority to jeopardize a key procedural rule vote if leaders brought it to the floor through the normal process. It takes just two GOP members to take an otherwise party-line rule vote, assuming all members are present and voting.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), which consists of 98 House Democrats, formally voted this week to oppose reauthorization of the warrantless surveillance powers, in a sign of the difficulty of getting enough Democratic support needed to fast-track a FISA vote.

Trump administration officials, including FBI Director Kash Patel and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, briefed House members about FISA earlier this week as GOP leaders sought to gain support for a FISA vote.

Johnson has argued that reforms that were included as part of the last FISA reauthorization bill in 2024, such as requiring agents to get approval before searching the 702 database for information that might concern Americans, are sufficient for now.

“Last time it was up for reauthorization, we instituted 56 substantive reforms to FISA,” Johnson said Tuesday. “By every measure and review, those are working just as we planned. We’ve not had the abuses that were happening before those reforms.”

In a sign that FISA reauthorization could face less overall resistance from Republicans than in the past, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the chair of the House Judiciary Committee who previously sought major FISA reforms and voted against reauthorization in 2024, told The Hill in an interview Wednesday that he will vote in favor of a clean FISA reauthorization.