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The Son of Patriot Act Also Rises
(Kim Zetter, WiredNews, June 14, 2004)
Patriot Act II legislation is rearing its head again in a new bill making its way through Congress. . . . The bill would strengthen laws that let the FBI demand that businesses hand over confidential records about patrons by assigning stiff penalties (up to five years in prison) to anyone who discloses that the FBI made the demand. The bill would also let the FBI compel businesses to cooperate with record requests, and it would expand the government's secret surveillance powers over noncitizens in the United States. . . . "There is no reason for this legislation," said lawyer Chip Pitts, head of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee of Dallas and a former constitutional law professor. "Given the expanse of powers and secrecy already granted in the Patriot Act, and given the unclear security benefits and possible security detriments of that legislation, why do we need a further amendment of the law to grant more powers to the government? . . . The bill, known as the Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Tools Improvement Act of 2003, or HR 3179, was introduced last September by Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wisconsin) and was co-sponsored by Rep. Porter Goss (R-Florida), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a possible contender to replace departing CIA chief George Tenet. . . . But critics, like conservative former Rep. Bob Barr (R-Georgia), say that rather than abandoning the legislation altogether, the department has been extracting provisions and having sympathetic lawmakers slip them one by one into new bills to pass the legislation piecemeal. At least five other bills pending in Congress also contain provisions from Patriot Act II, but HR 3179 is the one that's in imminent danger of being passed under the radar. . . . The new bill, HR 3179, was set to pass through Congress without a hearing last year, but the House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Sensenbrenner, changed its mind and held a hearing May 18. The bill is waiting for markup in that committee, but critics fear that Rep. Goss and the House Intelligence Committee will slip the bill into this year's Intelligence Authorization Act during a closed-door hearing on June 16, and pass it quickly before lawmakers can revise or further debate it. . . . opponents say the bill grants the government more power to investigate people without probable cause and to do so under a cloak of secrecy. As a result, individuals being investigated will have no chance to protest unconstitutional searches and seizures. . . . Under the Patriot Act and Patriot Act II provisions passed in the Intelligence Authorization Act last year, the FBI doesn't need a court order or probable cause to obtain the transaction records for patrons of libraries, Internet service providers, telephone companies, casinos, travel agents, jewelers, car dealers or other businesses. . . . The FBI can simply draft a "national security letter" stating records are needed for a national security investigation, without being specific about the data being sought or the people being investigated. . . . Under HR 3179, anyone who knowingly violates the secrecy clause could be imprisoned for up to a year, and anyone who violates it with "the intent to obstruct an investigation or judicial proceeding" could be imprisoned up to five years. The bill also lets authorities force individuals and companies to comply with security letters under contempt-of-court threats. . . . Dempsey, director of the Center for Democracy and Technology, said the bill tips the balance of power further into government hands while hampering the ability of people "to push back" and provide balance to government powers. . . . Currently, if government investigators request data that is too broad or intrusive, a company has some wiggle room to protect patrons' Fourth Amendment rights by resisting and negotiating a more targeted search, Dempsey said. But letting the FBI force cooperation while at the same time demanding secrecy and threatening imprisonment would make it unlikely that unreasonable secretive searches would ever be prevented or challenged. . . . Barr, a member of the American Conservative Union who has been practicing law since leaving Congress last year, testified against the bill during the May hearing and said that Congress should not be passing new laws to strengthen the Patriot Act while there are concerns about how the legislation has been used to date. The FBI has admitted using the Patriot Act for nonterrorism investigations, such as cases involving corruption in a Las Vegas strip club, drug trafficking and other criminal activity. . . . "If the government is able to conduct its powers in secret, then we never know the extent to which its power is being used or being abused," he said. "If the government wants to conduct more of its business in secret and without probable cause, then (we should) just amend or repeal the Fourth Amendment, not allow the government to eat away at it in small steps and pretend it's still there." . . . Barr said the law should allow recipients of national security letters the right to challenge them, just as they can challenge grand jury subpoenas. . . . "The last time (a Patriot Act II provision) slipped through and got signed was on the day of Saddam Hussein's capture," Pitts said. "There was not a single activist who knew it was coming down the pike. At least this time we know about it in advance." . . . In total, six bills pending in Congress contain provisions taken from Patriot Act II.

In addition to HR 3179, three other House bills (and two Senate companion bills) were introduced late last year:
HR 3179: Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Tools Improvement Act of 2003
HR 3037: Anti-Terrorism Tools Enhancement Act of 2003
HR 2934 and S 1604: Terrorist Penalties Enhancement Act of 2003
HR 3040 and S 1606: Pretrial Detention and Lifetime Supervision of Terrorists Act of 2003.

posted by Lorenzo 3:36 PM