WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.) released the following statement after Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced that the Senate will vote this week on the USA Freedom Act, which passed the House of Representatives last week with overwhelming bipartisan support. Senator Coons voted against a clean reauthorization of the Patriot Act in 2011 because it did not contain important privacy reforms.
“Americans have the right to be both free and secure. Since 2006, though, our government has operated a program that collects massive amounts of innocent Americans’ information without any suspicion that they have done anything wrong. This program, under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, authorizes bulk collection of individual call detail records, or metadata, and has compromised Americans’ civil liberties without any clear benefit to national security. It is time for that to change.
“That’s why I’m proud to cosponsor the bipartisan USA Freedom Act, which would end bulk collection and improve Section 215 so that it can be a more effective tool to conduct targeted national security investigations.
“Since I first came to the Senate, I have been deeply concerned about the scope and reach of our intelligence community’s bulk data program, which is based on a flimsy interpretation of the original Patriot Act and has questionable national security value. Particularly now that a federal circuit court has deemed the program illegal and confirmed these concerns, it would be irresponsible for Congress to continue reauthorizing the law without taking steps to address the unlawful surveillance it has allowed.
“The USA Freedom Act strikes an important balance and shows that we can protect both the American people and their civil liberties. It would end bulk collection by authorizing the federal government to seek call records from telecommunications providers only after establishing that a target record is relevant to an ongoing investigation. The bill also makes many other important improvements that would increase the transparency and functioning of our courts that handle foreign intelligence matters.
“The House took an important step last week in passing real reform by an overwhelming 338-88 margin, and it’s time for the Senate to vote on it as well. I voted against reauthorization of the Patriot Act in 2011 because the Senate had failed to meaningfully reform it. Four years later, the shortcomings of current law remain the same. I will continue to vote against any reauthorization of the Patriot Act that does not contain the key improvements to privacy and security in the USA Freedom Act.”
###