The House on Amending FISA Act
Today the House of Representatives voted on a bill that would amend the FISA Act of 1978, which deals with government wiretapping. The amendments would deny amnesty to telecommunication industries for complying with illegal warrant less wiretaps by the Bush administration but allow those companies to use government classified information in their defense to prove that they did comply with the law (if they indeed did).
The preceding debate included a series of passionate speeches by Democrats rejecting the Bush administration’s fear-mongering reasoning for the use of electronic surveillance of United States citizens without legal warrants. Glenn Greenwald covers the proceedings very well here. Though the bill will most certainly not become law (even if the Senate passes it, there will not be enough support from Congress to overturn the inevitable Presidential veto), this does mark significantly positive change for privacy advocates around the country.