Amy Klobuchar has been one of the two U.S. Senators representing Minnesota for more than two years now, which is long enough for her to decide what kind of senator she’d like to be. Will she be the sort of senator who reads and understands legislation before she votes on it? Or will she be [...]
In the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Richard Durbin just offered an amendment to S. 1692, a bill reauthorizing Patriot Act surveillance powers. It would have only required that when national security letters (NSLs) are issued without constitutional warrants, they have to be limited to surveillance of those who are suspected terrorists, suspected spies, or people [...]
At That’s My Congress, we would like to clarify a matter which may appear unimportant out of context. In context, however, the clarification demonstrates a small but consistent effort by two senators to reform surveillance laws in the direction of greater constitutional protection. In an otherwise excellent legislative analysis by Kevin Bankston of the Electronic [...]
This morning, Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont opened a full Judiciary Committee markup session on S. 1692, legislation to reauthorize the USA Patriot Act for another four years, until December of 2013. A video record of the committee meeting can be viewed here. In his introductory remarks, Senator Leahy made the following declaration regarding “national [...]
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