Efforts to renew key spy program keep failing in Congress
5/4/202619 min
Congress has been unable to reach an agreement over the reauthorization of a surveillance program the intelligence community says is vital for spying on foreign nationals. We discuss what is so controversial about Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and why concerns about it cross traditional partisan lines.
This episode: political correspondent Ashley Lopez, congressional reporter Eric McDaniel, and justice correspondent Ryan Lucas.
This podcast was produced by Casey Morell and Bria Suggs, and edited by Rachel Baye.
Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.
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First 90 secondsSpeaker 00:00
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Ashley Lopez· Host0:17
[upbeat music] Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics.
Eric McDaniel· Guest0:26
I'm Eric McDaniel. I cover Congress.
Ryan Lucas· Guest0:27
And I'm Ryan Lucas. I cover the Justice Department.
Ashley Lopez· Host0:29
And today feels special because Eric, you're back. It's been a while since you've been on the pod. It's very nice to have you.
Eric McDaniel· Guest0:34
I'm glad to be back.
Ashley Lopez· Host0:35
Today on the show, Congress has tried and failed and tried and failed to renew a key spy tool program. That's because some lawmakers worry that it is used by the FBI to review Americans' private calls, texts, and emails without a warrant. Before we get into this, I wanna have you both explain, though, what is this program, and what is it supposed to be used for?
Ryan Lucas· Guest0:55
All right, I can kick this off. Uh, so we're talking about Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Um, and what it does is it, it allows the government to collect, for foreign intelligence purposes, the emails, text messages, phone calls of foreigners overseas.
Ashley Lopez· Host1:10
Mm.
Ryan Lucas· Guest1:11
Even when they're talking to Americans. Uh, and they can do all of this, as you mentioned at the top, um, without a warrant. So it's a, it's a key tool people in, um, national security circles say, people in the intelligence community say, uh, it allows the government to learn a lot about what foreign adversaries are doing, what hackers are doing, what cartels are