Bipartisan Senate Coalition Stops Patriot Act Renewal

A bipartisan coalition of 47 senators just successfully blocked the USA Patriot Act from proceeding on to a full Senate vote, and thus will likely cause the expiration of 16 provisions, which represents less than 20% of the Act.

The White House pushed to make these 16 provisions permanent law. The Senate-House "compromise" bill raised the term of these provisions to four years from the much shorter term set by the Senate.

The victorious bipartisan Senate group strongly believes that the House-Senate "compromise" version of the Patriot Act gives government too much power to investigate people's private transactions, including bank, library, medical and computer records.

The bill's opponents also say the original act was rushed into law, and Congress should take more time now to make sure the rights of innocent Americans are safeguarded before the expiring provisions are extended or made permanent. In fact, when the USA Patriot Act was hurriedly passed in 2001 just months after the 9/11 attack, that voluminous legislation was printed the night before the vote, and no legislator had time to either read or digest its contents.

"There's no reason to compromise right to due process, the right to a judicial review, fair and reasonable standards of evidence in the pursuit of our security," said Sen. John E. Sununu (R-NH) earlier this week.

Following today's vote, the bipartisan coalition attempted to offer legislation expending the USA Patriot Act for three months, to allow for more in-depth study and debate. Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) refused to allow it, saying that the President will not sign any short-term extension of the Act. One senator accused the President of placing politics over the safety of the nation.

Several senators said their vote was affected by today's New York Times story that "Months after the Sept. 11 attacks, President Bush secretly authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans and others inside the United States to search for evidence of terrorist activity without the court-approved warrants ordinarily required for domestic spying, according to government officials."

Such unapproved, unchecked surveillance of private citizens is unprecedented in the US, and probably not legal under US law.
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Related Article - Senator Feingold Blogs Request for Activism on Patriot Act
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