If Trump is a budding autocrat, shouldn't Democrats limit his surveillance powers?

They should let him kill their FISA reauthorization bill

President Trump.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock)

Back in March, some of the U.S. government's extraordinary surveillance authorities under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) lapsed. Since that time, House Democrats have been pushing to renew them, with some slight additional protections for civil liberties, including a ban on the government rooting through your browser history without a warrant. Earlier this week, it seemed that a bipartisan agreement had been reached.

But now the bill seems very much in doubt. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), a civil liberties advocate, pulled his support when Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said the bill would indeed allow warrantless browser history surveillance in some cases. Then President Trump attacked the bill on Twitter, urging House Republicans to vote no "until such time as our Country is able to determine how and why the greatest political, criminal, and subversive scandal in USA history took place!" (a reference to the investigation of the Trump campaign's ties to Russia). Finally, late on Wednesday, news broke that Democratic leaders in the House were postponing a vote indefinitely after it became clear that few if any GOP members were willing to vote against the president's wishes.

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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.