Congress apparently had no idea the FBI has a secret air force
Congress has a proud history of objecting to warrantless surveillance when it's not of their own creation, so the recent revelation that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has a secret air force has several of our representatives upset.
Letters legislators have penned in the last few days indicate they were not previously aware of the FBI's fleet of more than 100 spy planes, which are used to monitor American cities. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) wrote the FBI to demand information on "(1) the scope, nature, and purpose of these operations; (2) what types of surveillance equipment were used in the operations, if not cell-site simulators; and (3) what legal authorities, if any, are being relied upon in carrying out these operations."
Meanwhile, in the House, a letter to the FBI from 16 members argued that "It is highly disturbing to learn that your agency may be [engaging in bulk phone record collection] and more with a secret fleet of aircraft engaged in surveillance missions.”
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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