Congressional Actions and Hubris

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Speaker Mike Johnson Tables Move to Slip Deep State Reauthorization in Defense Bill​

“Keeping FISA out of the NDAA is a victory for the American people who demand the end of warrantless government surveillance. I applaud Speaker Johnson’s decision to not cave to the Biden admin, Christopher Wray, and the entire intel community,” Rep. Warren Davidson (R-OH) told Breitbart News in a written statement.
At one point, Johnson’s office refused to confirm to Breitbart News Rep. Matt Gaetz’s (R-FL) claim that there would be no reauthorization, temporary or otherwise, of Section 702.

Johnson said that they would allow for the different Section 702 fixes to be considered on the House floor:

During a closed-door conference meeting on Tuesday, Johnson said that he could bring Jordan’s and Turner’s two competing bills up for a vote in a rare procedural gambit known as “King of the Hill” if there isn’t a consensus over Section 702, according to two Republicans in the room. Under that gambit, leadership can bring competing proposals to the floor as amendments, and whichever proposal is the last one that comes up for a vote and still gets a majority is the one that gets adopted. It allows leadership to try to influence the outcome by putting its preferred proposal last.

As recently as Tuesday, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), who cosponsored the Government Surveillance Reform Act with Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) to rein in Section 702, opposed an extension in the NDAA.

 

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Elise Stefanik: The ‘Joe Biden/Chuck Schumer Open Border Bill’ Is an ‘Absolute Non-Starter’​

The Senate released its emergency supplemental spending bill that contains, among other things, an establishment border bill, which as Breitbart News reported, would do little to stymy the migrant crisis at the southern border.

Stefanik wrote:

This Joe Biden/Chuck Schumer Open Border Bill is an absolute non-starter and will further incentivize thousands of illegals to pour in across our borders daily. House Republicans have already passed HR2 – the Secure Our Border Act, which would actually secure the border and return to the effective Trump policies with the most secure border in our nation’s history.

https://media.breitbart.com/media/2024/02/Elise-Stefanik-committee-hearing-hand-gestures-getty.jpg

 

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Senate Bill Gives Ukraine 75 Times as Much Funding as U.S. Border Wall​

The bill, negotiated by Sens. James Lankford (R-OK), Chris Murphy (D-CT), and Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ), would give Ukraine nearly $50 billion in U.S. tax dollars to defend its borders from Russian invasion.

At the same time, the bill spends just $650 million “to build and reinforce miles and miles of new border wall,” according to Lankford’s office. That funding is likely to build only a couple dozen miles of border wall.

The little funding for the border wall compared to Ukraine’s check comes as a record number of American adults support building barriers along the border to stem illegal immigration and drug trafficking.

 

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Senate releases $118 billion bipartisan aid proposal for Israel, Ukraine, border security​

• Senators released the full details of their highly anticipated bipartisan proposal to jointly fund Ukraine, Israel and the U.S. southern border.
• President Joe Biden initially proposed the aid package in October, but the bill has been stalled in closed-door Senate negotiations for months.
• The bill will likely meet stark opposition from House Republicans who proposed their own Israel-only funding package earlier in the weekend.

Senators on Sunday released the details of a $118.2 billion bipartisan aid proposal for Ukraine, Israel and the southern U.S. border, after months of painstaking, closed-door negotiations.

The long-awaited bill requests $60.1 billion for Ukraine aid, $14.1 billion for Israel and $20.2 billion to improve security at the U.S. border. It also includes smaller pockets of funding for humanitarian assistance in war-torn regions, and defense operations in the Red Sea and Taiwan.

President Joe Biden initially proposed a more than $105 billion aid package in October. The Senate's new deal roughly matches the funding proportions Biden had requested for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan.

 

[herb749]

I saw NBC news story on Monday talking about the false lie of 5000 people a day. Then a few paragraphs down it talks about the 5000 a day in the bill.

 

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I saw NBC news story on Monday talking about the false lie of 5000 people a day. Then a few paragraphs down it talks about the 5000 a day in the bill.

State Run Media .... let these reporters house one or more of these unvetted migrants

 

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House Conservatives Tank FISA Bill in Blow to Speaker Johnson​

House conservatives on April 10 tanked a procedural vote to advance a surveillance power reauthorization bill in protest of its lack of warrant requirements. The development is another blow to Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who already faces an ouster threat from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).

In a 193–226 vote, lawmakers decided not to advance Rep. Laurel Lee’s (R-Fla.) “Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act,” which would have extended the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act’s (FISA’s) controversial Section 702 for a period of five years. The warrantless surveillance power is due to lapse on April 19.


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FISA Section 702 is one of several post-9/11 surveillance authorities that have come under scrutiny as some lawmakers from both sides of the political aisle have raised concerns over its potential to violate the civil liberties of Americans.

Section 702, which was last authorized in 2018, was intended to permit warrantless surveillance of foreign nationals located outside the United States. However, in practice, it also sweeps up communications with U.S. citizens.

This has allowed FBI agents to extensively misuse the tool in recent years, such as by using it to search for the names of Black Lives Matter and Jan. 6, 2021, protesters.

The agency asserts that the program is vital to national security and that it has since undergone reform. Nevertheless, critics across the political spectrum have been apprehensive regarding the possibility of further constitutional infringements.

 

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MUST WATCH: John Kennedy Issues Blunt Warning To Schumer, Democrats Over Mayorkas Impeachment

 

[Hijinx]

Chuck Schumer, what a POS.

 

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Schumer Pledges Support For Israel After Iran Attack. Republicans Remind Him Senate Blocked Aid.​

 

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Lawmakers, Privacy Experts Sound Alarm on Most ‘Terrifying Expansions of Government Surveillance’ in History in Spy Powers Bill​

Mark Davis, a former presidential administration staffer and policy director for the Project for Privacy & Surveillance Accountability, said the Himes-Turner amendment will bring America closer to a “Chinese-style Panopticon”:

This amendment represents a breathtaking expansion of the American surveillance state. It enlists landlords and owners of small businesses of all sorts — retail stores, fitness centers, dentists’ offices and commercial office buildings — as the government’s partners in warrantless surveillance. Lacking the expertise of major telecoms to categorize communications, small business owners will likely just hand over all their data or give the government direct access to their equipment. These privacy breaches will poison consumer confidence in the businesses they patronize. It will complicate the deep divide that already exists between the U.S. and the EU over privacy and spying. And it will be yet another massive step toward bringing a Chinese-style Panopticon to the United States. [Emphasis added]

Those on the left have also cried foul at the Turner-Himes proposal, referring it to as the “Everybody Is a Spy” amendment.

Demand Progress Policy Director Sean Vitka said in a written statement on Monday:

These moves from the Intelligence Committee add up to a brazen and deliberate attempt to sneak through one of the most terrifying expansions in the history of government surveillance. This is not speculative: the amendment clearly allows the government to secretly conscript uninvolved Americans and American businesses to spy on each other. These KGB-style powers pose an existential threat to our civil liberties. The Senate must block this provision.
If the Senate fails to remove this amendment from the bill, it will be handing the president, and whoever the next president is, a knife to ram through the back of democracy. [Emphasis added]

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), after the House passed RISAA, said in no uncertain terms:

The House bill represents one of the most dramatic and terrifying expansions of government surveillance authority in history. It allows the government to force any American who installs, maintains, or repairs anything that transmits or stores communications to spy on the government’s behalf. That means anyone with access to a server, a wire, a cable box, a wifi router, or a phone. It would be secret: the Americans receiving the government directives would be bound to silence, and there would be no court oversight. [Emphasis added]

He added, “I will do everything in my power to stop this bill.”

 

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Democrats Seize Control of House: For First Time in Recorded History, Speaker Mike Johnson Relies on Minority Party Votes to Advance Foreign Aid Plan​

The powerful House Rules Committee, known for generations as “the Speaker’s committee” for the control the Speaker of the House possesses over the committee and its reputation as a rubber stamp for the Speaker’s agenda, sets the floor agenda for the House through what are known as rules.

 

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Mike Johnson’s Spending Bill Includes $300M for Border Patrol — in Ukraine​

Slipped into the funding package’s Ukraine spending is $300 million for “the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine 20 and National Police of Ukraine, including units supporting 21 or under the command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”

The State Border Guard Service is the Ukrainian equivalent of the U.S. Border Patrol.

At the same time, while illegal immigration stays sky-high at the southern border, President Joe Biden’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is asking Congress to fund only 34,000 detention beds for migrants arriving at the border — 7,500 fewer beds than those currently funded by lawmakers.

 

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Schumer Getting Rid of Mayorkas Impeachment Could Affect Democrats in November and Beyond​

In response to Brown referring to the impeachment effort as a "distraction," Moreno reminded that "Since Joe Biden took office, nearly 10 million people have invaded our country due to the open border policies of Biden, Mayorkas and Sherrod Brown. It isn’t a 'distraction' to demand accountability for the drugs, crime, death and destruction brought into this country because of these policies." He also insisted that "Sherrod Brown should uphold his constitutional duty and hold a full trial in the Senate for Mayorkas, otherwise it's a complete dereliction of his duty as a Senator."

 

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Wow Gaslighting – SSCI Chairman Mark Warner Lies About FISA-702 Fundamentals​

April 21, 2024 | Sundance | 117 Comments

This statement by Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner is so fraudulent in narrative construct it’s almost ridiculous. “SEN. WARNER: Let’s remember what 702 is. It is the ability for the United States government to surveil, listen in, on non-Americans foreigners who are abroad.”

Absolutely nothing about this statement is accurate. Foreigners do not have U.S constitutional protection. All foreign communications can be intercepted without issue, without FISA.

FISA-702 authority only pertains to Americans. The term “702” is specifically referencing private communication with/by an American. WATCH Warner lie:

 

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