An absolutely indispensable tool that Congress can give us in our fight against foreign adversaries is the reauthorization of section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance act. It is critical in securing our nation, and we are in crunch time with our 702 authorities set to expire next week. So let me be clear. Failure to reauthorize 702 or gutting it with some new kind of warrant requirement would be dangerous and put Americans lives at risk.

Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance act was enacted to make it easier for the government to address foreign terrorist threats. Targeting Americans is prohibited, but intelligence agencies have used section 702 to spy on hundreds of thousands of Americans every year, and this week it’s looking to get a lot worse. Elizabeth Goiteen of the Liberty and national Security program at the Brennan center for Justice does a great job of explaining it and sounding the alarm buried in the section 702 reauthorization bill passed by the House on Friday is the biggest expansion of domestic surveillance since the Patriot act.

Under current law, the government can compel electronic communication service providers that have direct access to communications. To assist the NSA in conducting section 702 surveillance, companies like Verizon and Google must turn over the communications of targets, which officially must be foreigners overseas. But this has been abused to spy on Americans. By changing the definition of electronic communications surveillance provider, an amendment offered by House intel committee leaders and passed by the House vastly expands the universe of entities that can be compelled to assist the NSA.

If the bill becomes law, any company or individual that provides any service whatsoever may be forced to assist in NSA surveillance as long as they have access to equipment on which communications are transmitted or stored. When the amendment was first unveiled, civil liberties advocates noted that the provision would encompass hotels, libraries and coffee shops, and so they were excluded. But the vast majority of Us businesses remain fair game, including barbershops, laundromats, fitness centers, hardware stores and any small business that provides wifi to their customers via routers.

It also includes commercial landlords that rent out offices, which would target journalists, lawyers, financial advisors, healthcare providers and anyone renting commercial office space. The amendment even includes service providers who come into our homes, such as house cleaners, plumbers, and IT service providers, all of whom could be forced to serve as surrogate spies and be required to give the NSA direct access. And none of them would be allowed to tell anyone.

They would be under a gag order and would face heavy penalties if they failed to comply. Having wholesale access to domestic communications, the NSA would then be on the honor system to retain only the communications of approved foreign targets, and we know from past experience that they cannot be trusted to do this. The Senate is scheduled to vote on the bill this week. Section 702 expires on April 19, but the Biden administration has obtained FISA court approval to continue section 702 surveillance until April of 2025.

Call your senators now and tell them to block the everyone is a spy surveillance bill. Reporting for Infowars, this is Greg Reese. .

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