Dear Congress: Dispose Section 702 After Expiration

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Friend, It’s no secret that 9/11 led to a drastic expansion of American surveillance. But many people don’t realize that this year Congress has a chance to roll back one of the country’s most abused surveillance powers. But if we don’t act soon, Congress will allow intelligence agencies to continue with illegal business as usual. Section 702 gives the NSA an unconstitutional blank check to collect nearly all phone calls, text messages, and emails. Section 702 isn’t just aimed abroad but is also routinely abused here at home. The FBI habitually violated the law’s half-hearted restriction on surveilling Americans, unlawfully accessing our data over 278,000 times. The FBI has already used the Section 702 database to target political protesters across the ideological spectrum, and the abuses will only continue. Alarmingly, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer attempted to slip Section 702 reauthorization into a spending bill necessary to avert a government shutdown that would’ve happened today. Earlier this week, S.T.O.P. joined over 30 civil rights groups in pressuring Schumer to cut Section 702 reauthorization from the bill and we won—for now. There is still a chance Congress will revive Section 702, so we must continue pressuring our elected lawmakers to let this awful surveillance law expire in December. Americans should never have to sacrifice privacy for a functioning government. We want to thank our partners at the Brennan Center, Demand Progress, Center for Democracy & Technology, and many other organizations for staving off Section 702 reauthorization this week. In solidarity, Allie Lennard and Aysia Garnett  S.T.O.P. Communications Interns Share Tweet Forward Copyright © 2023 STOP, All rights reserved. Our mailing address is: STOP 40 Rector Street 9th Floor New York, NY 10006