'We should all be scared to death': Mike Lee would vote to repeal FISA

Washington Examiner ^ | January 04, 2020 07:21 PM | Daniel Chaitin

[E. Pluribus Unum]

A Republican senator said he would vote to repeal the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act following a scathing report that found serious problems in how the FBI sought to wiretap a former Trump campaign adviser.

Utah Sen. Mike Lee, a longtime critic of the FISA program, told One America News Network on Saturday that the audit released last month by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz was a wake-up call to "stop allowing the American people to be subjected to this type of abuse and manipulation."

"We should all be scared to death," Lee said. "We shouldn't rest until FISA is either repealed entirely or drastically, dramatically reformed."

Horowitz's team found 17 "significant errors and omissions" in the FBI’s efforts to obtain a warrant and three renewals from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to surveil onetime Trump campaign aide Carter Page electronically as part of its counterintelligence investigation into members of President Trump's campaign and their ties to Russia. Page, an American citizen, was never charged with any wrongdoing.

Horowitz did not find evidence that it was motivated by political bias in the opening of its counterintelligence investigation, but he was unable to say if bias tainted the process of obtaining FISA warrants against Page. Following the release of Horowitz's report, Attorney General William Barr said the FBI had "insufficient" evidence to justify steps taken in the Trump-Russia investigation and is overseeing a related criminal inquiry by U.S. Attorney John Durham.

[zeugma]

Power corrupts, Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

I would disagree with Acton's statement to this degree...
It is not power that corrupts. It is power without accountability that corrupts absolutely.

Power is inherent in the political process. It is the lack of accountability that destroys.