• Tag Archives Amash

  • Amash amendment only enforced Patriot Act, not Fourth Amendment

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    Last week, Rep. Justin Amash, R-Mich., introduced an amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill. It required the NSA and other government agencies merely to obey the Patriot Act, not the Fourth Amendment. That the data to be collected are “relevant to an ongoing national security investigation” doesn’t mean that there is probable cause that the person whose records are collected has committed a crime.

    The language was taken from Sec. 214 of the Patriot Act, which amended Section 402 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1842).

    Amash’s amendment did not attempt to enforce the standard set in the Fourth Amendment, which requires “probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” That the data to be collected is merely relevant to an ongoing national security investigation doesn’t necessarily mean that there is probable cause that the person whose records are collected has committed a crime.

    That means the Patriot Act is unconstitutional, according to any reasonable interpretation of the Fourth Amendment.

    The NSA’s activities do not even meet the lower standards set by the Patriot Act. They are illegal even under an unconstitutional law.

    It is important to remember the difference between “constitutional” and “legal.” Legal means the activity in question complies with existing law passed by a legislative body. Constitutional means the legislative body had been given the power to pass the law in the first place.

    The U.S. Congress not only wasn’t given the power to pass the Patriot Act, it was strictly prohibited from doing so by the Fourth Amendment. Congress passed the legislation anyway. The NSA hasn’t even complied with that.

    Not only was Amash’s amendment defeated, but its sponsors were met with a backlash of scorn and ridicule from Governor Chris Christie and other defenders of the national security apparatus, citing the need to protect Americans from terrorism, regardless of the legal and constitutional issues.

    Source: Amash amendment only enforced Patriot Act, not Fourth Amendment


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  • Justin Amash’s support for free enterprise earns enmity of Big Business

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    Ellis explained that Amash is too beholden to principles and the Constitution: “He’s got his explanations for why he’s voted,” Ellis said, “but I don’t really care. I’m a businessman, I look at the bottom line.”

    What has Amash done in his three and a half years in the House to earn the Chamber’s wrath? Look over his Chamber of Commerce scorecard and you see a handful of votes where he gets a demerit from the business lobby.

    Amash in 2012 voted against reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank, a federal agency that subsidizes U.S. exports with taxpayer-backed loans and loan guarantees to foreign companies and governments. He opposes Ex-Im’s renewal this year, too.

    Amash opposed as too profligate a few budget agreements the Chamber supported. He twice opposed patent legislation the Chamber backed. Amash twice crossed the Chamber by opposing cybersecurity legislation that gave immunity to tech companies cooperating with U.S. intelligence data collection. When highway bills spent more than the Highway Trust Fund could afford, Amash also voted no, to the Chamber’s disapproval.

    Some of these issues are complex disputes (such as patent law), but on others Amash’s problem was simply taking the whole free-enterprise, limited-government thing a little too seriously.

    The tension between “free enterprise” and “pro-business” is nothing new — the Chamber supported the bailouts and President Obama’s stimulus and regularly backs corporate subsidies. But somehow, Democrats have until now convinced most of the mainstream media that arguments for free enterprise are simply defenses of corporate America.

    Let’s hope nobody believes that line anymore.

    via Justin Amash’s support for free enterprise earns enmity of Big Business


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  • Intelligence committee withheld key file before critical NSA vote, Amash claims

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    A leader of the US congressional insurrection against the National Security Agency’s bulk surveillance programs has accused his colleagues of withholding a key document from the House of Representatives before a critical surveillance vote.

    Justin Amash, the Michigan Republican whose effort to defund the NSA’s mass phone-records collection exposed deep congressional discomfort with domestic spying, said the House intelligence committee never allowed legislators outside the panel to see a 2011 document that described the surveillance in vague terms.

    The document, a classified summary of the bulk phone records collection effort justified under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, was declassified by the Obama administration in late July.

    The Justice Department and intelligence agencies prepared it for Congress before a 2011 vote to reauthorize the Patriot Act, and left it for the intelligence committees in Congress to make the document available to their colleagues.

    “It is not acceptable for the intelligence committee, or any other committee, to withhold critically important information pertaining to a program prior to the vote,” Amash told the Guardian.

    Full article: http://www.theguardi … sa-vote-justin-amash


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