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Curated research library of TV news clips regarding the NSA, its oversight and privacy issues, 2009-2014

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Primary curation & research: Robin Chin, Internet Archive TV News Researcher; using Internet Archive TV News service.

Speakers

Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 03/11/2014
Leahy: We are supposed to be the conscience of the nation. The Senator from California, Senator Feinstein, has spoken to our conscience, to every one of us, 100 senators, men and women, both parties. She has spoken to our conscience now let's stand up for this country. Let's stand up as United States senators should and as the Senator from California has.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: I introduced the original U.S.A. Freedom Act last October with republican Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner. The judiciary committee held six hearings, public hearings, to address these issues. We learned that the bulk phone records had not, as previously advertised, thwarted 54 terrorist plots or even dozens or even a few. In fact, we learned through our public hearings, after all the talk about we needed this because it thwarted 54 terrorist acts, it may have possibly helped on one. Now, that is an important fact for those who now argue that the N.S.A.'s bulk phone records program is somehow essential to our fight against ISIL. It did nothing to stop ISIL from starting in the first place.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: Our bill protects Americans, enhances privacy protections, it ends indiscriminate data collection, but it keeps the tools our intelligence community needs to protect our nation. That's important to remember, and that's why our intelligence community strongly supports this bill. I worked in law enforcement. I’m a native of Vermont where the right of privacy is cherished. I know we can have both liberty and security.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: The U.S.A. Freedom Act provides for commonsense reforms to government surveillance. It promotes greater accountability and transparency in the government's surveillance programs and improves the FISA courts. It is a carefully crafted bill. It builds on what the House of Representatives did. It has the support of the Director of National Intelligence, the Attorney General, the Director of N.S.A., American technology companies, the privacy and civil liberty groups across the political spectrum ranging from the N.R.A. to the ACLU and TechFreedom. Lawmakers from all parts of the political spectrum from the right to the left support this bill. They know it's a reasonable and responsible compromise.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: As both the ACLU and the N.R.A. pointed out, every day the Senate fails to vote on these reforms is a day in which law-abiding citizens have reason to fear that the constitutional protections so dear to the founders and so crucial to the functioning of our free society no longer apply. Echoing actually the words we just heard from the Senator from Utah. Every day we fail to act is another day American businesses are harmed. One conservative think tank says the mistrust engendered by the N.S.A.'s programs could cost the U.S. technology industry between $35 billion and $180 billion over the next three years. That's a staggering amount. So let's listen to the intelligence community. Ask the Director of National Intelligence. He'll tell you it's far better for our national security and for our fight against terrorism if we pass this.
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Marco Rubio
U.S. Senator, R-Florida
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Rubio: This program (The U.S.A. Patriot Act) was specifically designed to address what the intelligence gaps that existed after the 9/11 attacks. Because I promise you, if God, forbid, any horrifying event like that were to happen, the first question we will be asked is, why didn't we know about it and why didn't we prevent it. And if this program is gutted, we will not be able potentially to know about it and we will not be able to prevent it. Residing president of the Senate: The Senator from Vermont. Mr. Leahy: Leahy: Mr. President, of course this program does not gut it. It actually enhances it. Secondly, if this was important to stop ISIL, ISIL never would have started. The fact is, we had this program way beyond anything anybody's talking about today. It didn't -- it didn't slow up or eliminate one iota, ISIL. That is -- that's a straw man that we shouldn't even have here. It has no affect on that. Everybody who's read the intelligence knows that.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
The presiding President of the Senate: On this vote, the yeas are 58, the nays are 42. Three-fifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn not having voted in the affirmative, the motion is not agreed to. Leahy: Mr. President? Pres. Of Senate: The Senator from Vermont. Mr. Leahy Leahy: Mr. President, obviously I'm disappoint by tonight's vote. I'm not new to this fight. I mean, we've had six hearings on this issue. We had the interesting testimony of the head of the N.S.A. who talked about 50-some-odd terrorist activities that have been thwarted by what was in the law. But when he had to testify in public, it came down to possibly one. I mention that because people ask whether we had hearings. We had six.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: But the reason I say I'm not new to this fight, the very first vote I cast as a United States senator in 1975 was in favor of the senate resolution that created the Church committee. I've worked ever since to ensure a strong oversight of surveillance authorities. We found the Church committee that administrations of both parties had so badly misused the tools they had in the intelligence community and we tried to put in restrictions that would balance our constitutional rights and our security we needed as Americans. And we tried to do that and I think we did.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: It's why over the past decade I've consistently opposed extending the U.S. Patriot Act and FISA amendment sunsets without including meaningful reforms. The first sunsets were put in place by the republican leader of the house, Dick Armey, conservative republican and myself here in the senate. We joined together for the same thing, saying that if you don't have an ability to look at these issues on a periodic basis, then they'll be -- they'll go out of hand. I've fought the status quo every step of the way in these efforts but the broad coalition we built in favor of the U.S.A. Freedom Act shows we're gaining ground.
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Patrick Leahy
U.S. Senator (D- Vermont), Judiciary Committee Chairman
CSPAN2 11/18/2014
Leahy: And while I'm critical of those republicans who failed to answer the call of the American people who elected them to stand up and work across the aisle, those who reverted to scare tactics rather than working productively to protect America's basic privacy rights and our national security, I want to acknowledge the hard work and principled stance of several republicans Senator Heller, Senator Lee and Senator Cruz, as well as other republicans in the other body, including my initial partner in this effort, Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner. They've been true partners in this reform effort, like Senators Franken and Blumenthal, Feinstein and others who worked with me on transparency and the FISA court reforms in here.
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