Untitled Document

[00:00:00] Why shouldn't we treat the querying of [00:00:02] US persons out of this dragnet database? [00:00:06] Why shouldn't we treat that as a [00:00:07] separate Fourth Amendment event [00:00:09] requiring some additional process? Maybe [00:00:11] a warrant as Senator Lee has proposed, [00:00:14] maybe some other process, but why [00:00:16] shouldn't we say, you know, actually, [00:00:17] yes, when you go to this massive [00:00:19] database and ask about a US person, [00:00:22] that's a Fourth Amendment event that [00:00:23] requires some process, some scrutiny. [00:00:26] >> Yes. And so there are two answers to [00:00:27] that. One is a legal answer and we've [00:00:29] covered that a lot. But in in short, we [00:00:31] don't require the FBI agent to get a [00:00:33] warrant before going to check the filing [00:00:35] cabinet. [00:00:35] >> But this is totally analogous to that as [00:00:37] the hosami court said, right? [00:00:39] >> And as indeed the court the US Supreme [00:00:41] Court said in Riley, [00:00:42] >> I mean this this is a completely [00:00:44] analogous to saying that you have a [00:00:46] piece of information down in a locker [00:00:47] somewhere that you got pursuant to [00:00:49] probable cause and indeed a warrant for [00:00:52] a particular case. Here you have a [00:00:54] massive drag net of information. You [00:00:57] just told me a second ago that you [00:00:58] couldn't target the American citizens. [00:01:00] So the the none of this none of this [00:01:03] information with the American citizens [00:01:04] has received any process whatsoever. But [00:01:07] now the FBI or the inter same whomever [00:01:10] can go and query this database for the [00:01:12] first time and get information on US [00:01:15] citizens particularly for the first [00:01:16] time. And you're telling me that that's [00:01:18] not a separate fourth amendment event. [00:01:21] Well, Senator, I don't know if the the [00:01:22] first time and when this information [00:01:24] comes across the transom, there's an [00:01:25] analyst, let's say at NSA who's [00:01:27] monitoring that target or at the FBI if [00:01:28] it's one of their investigations and [00:01:30] they can read the whole thing. [00:01:32] >> It's the first time that the US person [00:01:34] has been the subject of inquiry, though. [00:01:35] It has to be under the statute because [00:01:36] you told me a second ago you can't [00:01:38] target a US person, right? [00:01:39] >> It's got to be purely incidental. And [00:01:41] the statute also says you can't target a [00:01:42] foreign person for the purpose of [00:01:44] getting information on a US person [00:01:46] through the back door. So it therefore [00:01:48] follows that when you go to query the [00:01:50] database later query a US person in the [00:01:54] database that's the first time the US [00:01:56] person is the subject of the inquiry and [00:01:58] my question to you is that looks an [00:02:00] awful lot like a search a search and [00:02:03] seizure for a fourth amendment purposes. [00:02:05] Why shouldn't we say yeah okay that's a [00:02:07] fourth amendment event. We need some [00:02:09] additional process around that. [00:02:11] >> Yeah and senator I think the government [00:02:13] has already collected this information. [00:02:15] In many cases, an analyst may have sat [00:02:16] there and read the email. To me, it [00:02:18] seems passing strange to say that [00:02:20] someone has a reasonable expectation of [00:02:22] privacy still in something that an [00:02:23] intelligence analyst has sat there and [00:02:25] read as it came across in their [00:02:27] collection. [00:02:28] >> I it just seems to me you can't have it [00:02:29] both ways. You you can't say that [00:02:30] there's no targeting of US persons. [00:02:32] That's forbidden under the statute. But [00:02:33] then when they do want to actually [00:02:35] target a US person, they don't need any [00:02:36] process for it. You're saying on the one [00:02:38] hand, no, no process need on the front [00:02:40] end, no process need on the back end. I [00:02:41] I just think, Mr. Chairman, this is this [00:02:43] is an extremely extremely important [00:02:46] issue. 278,000 [00:02:49] improper queries of Americans in one [00:02:51] year alone. The idea that we would renew [00:02:54] 702 without some sort of reforms to [00:02:56] protect US citizens, I think is just [00:02:59] totally irresponsible.