President Trump on Wednesday called on Congress to pass an 18-month extension of a federal surveillance law without changes, saying the military needs it more than ever due to the war with Iran.
Mr. Trump, in a social media post, said House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune are working toward passing this “clean” extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) before it expires at midnight on April 19.
The president stressed the importance of having FISA as a tool while U.S. “military activities are ongoing against the terrorist Iranian regime.”
“It is more important than ever that we remain vigilant, PROTECT our Homeland, Troops, and Diplomats stationed abroad, and maintain our ability to quickly stop bad actors seeking to cause harm to our People and our Country,” Mr. Trump said. “The fact is, whether you like FISA or not, it is extremely important to our Military.”
House Republican leaders are trying to corral enough votes to pass a reauthorization of the law without changes. Convincing rank-and-file Republicans to support the reauthorization will be difficult, as many have demanded changes to Section 702.
The provision, which must be reauthorized every two years, allows U.S. spy agencies to intercept communications of foreigners abroad. Americans can be ensnared in surveillance when communicating with foreigners. The FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies have also searched the collected data for information about Americans.
Mr. Johnson hoped to have a vote by March 27, when lawmakers begin a two-week recess for Easter and Passover, but the vote has been rescheduled for the week after Congress returns on April 13.
Mr. Trump described it as “a law that was passed many years ago by Congress to collect Intelligence on Foreigners and Noncitizens. When used properly, FISA is an effective tool to keep Americans safe.”
He said “the Critical and Common Sense Reforms that were made in the last Reauthorization of FISA must remain intact to protect the American People from abuses.”
“Nobody understands this better than me, as I was a victim of the worst and most illegal abuse of FISA in our Nation’s History, by Radical Left Lunatics who lied to the FISA Court to spy on my 2016 Presidential Campaign in their attempt to RIG the Election in favor of Crooked Hillary Clinton,” Mr. Trump said.
Republican leaders backing the clean reauthorization said the necessary updates were made after 2016.
“There’s been a huge improvement based on the reforms we’ve done over the last decade. And this is a temporary extension at a time when we … have this military operation going on,” said House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, Ohio Republican.
In 2024, Mr. Jordan voted against re-upping Section 702 after the House did not add a requirement that intelligence officers obtain a warrant before reviewing any information inadvertently collected on Americans.
Mr. Jordan said the environment at the FBI has changed for the better because of the changes that Republicans pushed.
“Four years ago, there were 278,000 times that the FBI didn’t follow their own rules. Last year was 127,” he told The Washington Times. “They used to do 3 million searches in 2021. Last year, total searches were 9,000. So that’s the kind of reforms and the accountability, the auditing, the penalties that were kicked in.”
Mr. Johnson said the clean extension was needed to gather the “intelligence that we use to protect and keep Americans safe.”
Still, a bipartisan congressional group is demanding an overhaul of FISA. They find themselves in a similar position to two years ago, when they failed to rally enough support for their cause.
Other obstacles may arise.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, Florida Republican, wants to attach the GOP’s voter ID bill, the SAVE America Act, to the FISA reauthorization to push it through the Senate. However, the move would threaten to derail the FISA bill.
Mr. Johnson likely needs Democratic votes to bring the bill to the House floor and pass it, but Democratic support is far from guaranteed.
Otherwise, the GOP cannot lose more than one member, and several House Freedom Caucus members said they will not support a clean reauthorization.
Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland, the chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, said his group may want “minor reforms” in exchange for their support.
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.
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