CONYERS, GOODLATTE and Judiciary Committee Members Introduce the USA Liberty Act

Washington, D.C. – House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.)Ranking Member John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.),  Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and Investigations Subcommittee Ranking Member Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas), and Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet Subcommittee Ranking Member Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) today introduced the USA Liberty Act (H.R. 3989). This bipartisan bill reforms and reauthorizes Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which is set to expire at the end of this year, to protect both national security and Americans’ civil liberties.

The USA Liberty Act preserves the core purpose of Section 702: the collection of communications by targeting non-U.S. persons located outside the U.S. in order to identify and thwart terrorist plots against our nation and our citizens. The bill also creates a new framework of protections and transparency requirements to ensure that the government’s use of Section 702 accords with principles enshrined in our Constitution that protect individual liberty. It provides new accountability measures to address the unmasking of U.S. persons’ identities and new reporting requirements on the number of U.S. persons who have been swept up in Section 702 collection. The bill also enhances national security by increasing penalties for those who leak classified information and calling on the intelligence agencies to share information with each other and with our allies to combat terrorism.

Below are statements from Judiciary Committee leaders on the introduction of the USA Liberty Act.

Ranking Member Conyers: “Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is essential to the intelligence community’s gathering of foreign intelligence and detecting threats to the homeland.  Its reauthorization should include reforms that bring this authority better in line with our sense of privacy and due process.  Indeed, we believe that it will only be possible to reauthorize Section 702 with such reforms in place. The bipartisan USA Liberty Act is designed to accomplish this goal.”

Chairman Goodlatte: “The USA Liberty Act protects Americans’ lives and their civil liberties. This bipartisan bill reauthorizes a critical national security tool that keeps Americans safe but also reforms it to protect Americans’ constitutional rights. It contains more accountability, transparency, and oversight so that the American people have confidence that our cherished liberties continue to be protected as the intelligence community keeps us safe from foreign enemies wishing to harm our nation and citizens. The bill also contains a number of measures to further enhance national security so that our country remains free and safe. I thank the many members who have worked on this bill for months and look forward to bringing it up in the House Judiciary Committee soon.”

Crime Subcommittee Chairman Sensenbrenner: “The USA Liberty Act is carefully crafted, bipartisan legislation that represents the type of common sense compromise that we desperately need in this country. It balances privacy and security concerns by requiring greater oversight, transparency, and accountability of the government’s surveillance powers while limiting the incidental collection of Americans’ communications and requiring a court order to query data. It also puts in place a critical six-year sunset provision, allowing Congress to respond appropriately to the ever-changing threats facing our nation. This is smart, forward-leaning legislation that I urge my colleagues to get behind.”

Crime Subcommittee Ranking Member Jackson Lee: “Collectively, what Democrats and Republicans have agreed on is a strategy that secures the homeland, while preserving cherished liberties that still make America the envy of the world.”

IP Subcommittee Ranking Member Nadler: “The USA Liberty Act is an attempt to strike the appropriate balance, as we did in the USA Freedom Act, of giving our intelligence agencies the tools they need to keep us safe while making sure individual liberty and privacy rights are better protected. For the first time, the bill institutes a requirement for a warrant—based on probable cause—for criminal investigators to query the information obtained by the 702 program. In addition, this legislation significantly curbs the amount of incidental information that can be searched, and, most importantly, institutes critical operational norms for the 702 program that make it more accountable, more transparent, and ultimately more effective in striking the critical balance between national security needs and the individual’s constitutional rights. I want to thank Chairman Goodlatte and Ranking Member Conyers for working in good faith on the USA Liberty Act, which goes a long way in reforming government surveillance under Section 702.”

Additional original cosponsors of the bill include Representatives Lamar Smith (R-Texas), Steve Chabot (R-Ohio), Doug Collins (R-Ga.), Mike Johnson (R-La.), John Rutherford (R-Fla.) Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), Ted Deutch (D-Fla.), and Jamie Raskin (D-Md.).

Background: FISA Section 702, which will expire on December 31, 2017, authorizes surveillance of the communications of non-U.S. persons located outside of the United States in order to protect national security. It reportedly contributes to a quarter of all National Security Agency surveillance and has been used on multiple occasions to detect and prevent horrific terrorist plots against our country. Although Congress designed this authority to target non-U.S. persons located outside of the United States, it is clear that Section 702 surveillance programs can and do incidentally collect information about U.S. persons when U.S. persons communicate with the foreign targets of Section 702 surveillance.

House Judiciary Summary of USA Liberty Act To Reform and Reauthorize Section FISA Section 702 by Beverly Tran on Scribd

House Introduced USA Liberty Act Bill Text by Beverly Tran on Scribd

Voting is beautiful, be beautiful ~ vote.©

Dem says Perry wants Congress to get jobs at WalMart

By Pete Kasperowicz - 12/02/11 09:57 AM ET

Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) on Friday morning said GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry is pushing for a Congress that works just half of its time in Washington, and the other half of its time at members' local WalMart.

Speaking on the House floor, Cohen was critiquing a GOP bill that could come up next week that would require Congress to approve all federal regulations. Cohen said this would require Congress to be in session even longer, which goes against candidate Perry's prescription for a half-time Congress.

"How can we work half time under President Perry?" Cohen asked. "We'd have to be working time and a half. And we know there's not enough money for overtime, and President Perry doesn't want us to do that, he wants us to get a separate job when we go home.

"We go back to San Antonio, we work half time as a Congressman and half time we work at WalMart," Cohen added. "That's what he's suggesting."

Perry suggested that Congress only work part time in mid-November in order to reduce Washington's power and also to save money.

Cohen spoke during debate on H.R. 3010, the Regulatory Accountability Act, which would expand the requirements of federal agencies to base rules on evidence, consider less intrusive alternatives, and weigh costs and benefits more carefully. H.R. 10, likely up next week, would require Congress to approve major rules.

Republicans today said these sorts of changes are needed in light of how federal rules are stifling U.S. job creation.

"By it's own admission, the administration's 2011 regulatory agenda contains 200 regulations that typically will affect the economy by $100 million or more every year," House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-NJ) said.

"For employers, the people who create jobs and pay taxes, the impact of these costly regulations is clear," he added. "Government regulation has become a barrier to economic growth and job creation."

But Ranking Judiciary Member John Conyers (D-Mich.) said these bills are an attempt to completely halt the federal rulemaking process.

"These bills are blatantly and unhesitatingly designed to slow down and even halt all federal rulemaking, thereby threatening public health and safety by undermining the agencies' ability to address a whole range of issues," he said.

Voting is beautiful, be beautiful ~ vote.©

Lawmakers urge close look at Russia's IP practices

By Vicki Needham - 11/11/11 10:04 AM ET

As Russia moves to join the World Trade Organization, top lawmakers on the House and Senate Judiciary panels are pressing U.S. trade officials to examine its intellectual property practices. 

In a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.), Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) expressed "serious concerns over continuing gaps and lapses in the protection and enforcement of intellectual property rights concerns" by Russia. 

“There are a number of significant concerns with respect to the denial of adequate and effective IPR [intellectual property rights] protection, or the denial of equitable market access for persons that rely on IPR protection, in Russia,” the panel members wrote this week. 

The lawmakers are insisting that a "high standard accession package will be essential before both houses of Congress can consider a vote to remove Russia" from the Jackson-Vanik amendment — a 37-year-old provision crafted to put pressure on Communist nations for human-rights abuses and emigration policies, which has been "a symbol of lingering tensions in the U.S.-Russia relationship," according to the Council on Foreign Relations. 

President Obama said on Thursday that he wants to work with Congress to end the application of the amendment, which most experts argue isn't relevant anymore.  

On Thursday, Russia cleared its final hurdle for its long-awaited entry into the WTO, a move strongly backed by the Obama administration. 

"The Government of Russia must demonstrate via transparent, substantive and prompt actions its commitment to adhere fully to the obligations it will assume as a future member of the WTO," the lawmakers wrote. "Not only is the credibility of the rules-based system of international trade at stake, but should Russia fail to conform to its obligations in a thorough and timely manner, the adverse consequences for U.S. innovators and their workers will continue to be significant.”

Lawmakers citied examples such as widespread counterfeiting and piracy of hard goods, storage of pirated CDs and DVDs on several government-controlled military-industrial sites and gaps in Russian law and enforcement efforts with respect to piracy over the Internet, according to USTR's recent report on the state of global intellectual property. 

"With respect to gaps in Russian law, your report states that it is the position of the United States to urge Russia to enact online infringement legislation that addresses all forms of piracy over the Internet and provides for the swift removal of infringing content," they wrote.  

The report also encourages Russia to enact legislation establishing a specialized intellectual property court and calls for Russia’s enforcement officials to increase investigations, and for Russian prosecutors to seek deterrent penalties in judicial proceedings.

Russia remains on a watch list that identifies countries with "the most onerous or egregious" intellectual property policies and practices that have the "greatest adverse impact on relevant products of the United States," they wrote.

They also noted a separate report to Congress by the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive that identifies Russian cyber-espionage as a "dangerous threat to our economy and national security."  

While they acknowledged that progress has been made since 2006, when the United States and Russia reached a bilateral agreement on intellectual protection and enforcement in Russia, they also agreed that the reports "raise serious questions about the intention and commitment of the Russian government to abide by and enforce the obligations it will assume as a member of the WTO."

"Not only is the credibility of the rules-based system of international trade at stake, but should Russia fail to conform to its obligations in a thorough and timely manner, the adverse consequences for U.S. innovators and their workers will continue to be significant," they wrote. 

Letter to Ambassador Ron Kirk From U.S. House Judiciary Regrading Violations of Intellectual Property Right...

Voting is beautiful, be beautiful ~ vote.©

Rep. Lamar Smith Wants Hearings To "Embarrass The President"

August 22, 2011 10:24 am ET — Matt Gertz

On Thursday, Roll Call reported that Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) was planning to use his House Judiciary Committee gavel this fall to promote a "jobs agenda." This would represent a significant shift for a committee that has largely been focused on radical attacks on undocumented immigrants.

But later that day, the Obama administration announced that it would begin reviewing the cases of the 300,000 illegal immigrants currently awaiting deportation and prioritize the expulsion of the more dangerous criminal violators, rather than targeting low-level immigration offenders for deportation.

Smith quickly abandoned his "jobs agenda," telling right-wing radio host Joe Pagliarulo that he was now planning to hold hearings on the subject with the avowed purpose of trying to "embarrass the President." Smith also suggested that the House Appropriations Committee would defund the administration's ability to implement their plan.

During his interview with Pagliarulo, Smith also repeatedly pushed the falsehood that the administration proposal constitutes "amnesty." In fact, while immigrants who are not deported may apply for work permits, the plan does not provide them with citizenship or even a path to citizenship.

SMITH: As to what our recourse is, what we can do, we can do a couple things, at least in the House where the Republicans are in the majority. We can conduct hearings, oversight hearings, we can pull in administration officials, make them testify under oath, find out what's going on, try to, frankly, embarrass the President and push back and get the American people on our side to push back against the administration. Secondly, the Appropriations Committee can defund any of these efforts, but unfortunately, on the appropriations level, you can only defund it one year at a time, so that's not a long-term solution. Frankly, Joe, the long-term solution is, if you don't like what the President is doing, you have an opportunity in a year and a half to change presidents, and that's ultimately where the answer is going to lie.

Listen:

Smith's call for hearings to "embarrass the president" comes on the heels of Rep. Darrell Issa's (R-CA)comment that his planned Oversight Committee investigation of trumped-up attacks on Obama's adherence to election law would make "good theater." House Republicans apparently prefer to use their committees to conduct partisan attacks, rather than to attempt to solve America's problems.