Democrats' bewildering decision to hand President Trump more surveillance powers

Obama bamboozled Democrats into giving the NSA more surveillance powers. Now Trump controls the agency and they don't seem to care.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats.
(Image credit: Getty Images)

Back in 2005, The New York Times reported that President Bush had been lying through his teeth about a warrantless wiretapping program his administration had set up under the NSA. The baldly illegal program required participation from telecom companies, who were thus exposed to millions of lawsuits from their spied-on customers. Bush urged Congress to pass a bill granting the telecoms retroactive immunity, prompting outrage from Democrats, including then-Sen. Barack Obama, who promised to filibuster any bill with such an immunity provision in October 2007.

But Obama blatantly broke his promise, not only failing to filibuster the bill, but actually voting for it. That act laid the groundwork for an incomprehensible move last week by key Democrats, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and ranking Democratic member of the House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff, to vote against an amendment requiring the NSA to get a warrant before spying on American citizens. (It is worth emphasizing that at this very moment, Donald J. Trump is the president of the United States.) It's just the latest bitter fruit from Obama's wretched civil liberties legacy.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
To continue reading this article...
Continue reading this article and get limited website access each month.
Get unlimited website access, exclusive newsletters plus much more.
Cancel or pause at any time.
Already a subscriber to The Week?
Not sure which email you used for your subscription? Contact us
Ryan Cooper

Ryan Cooper is a national correspondent at TheWeek.com. His work has appeared in the Washington Monthly, The New Republic, and the Washington Post.