{"id":9320,"date":"2015-06-01T11:05:35","date_gmt":"2015-06-01T15:05:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/?p=9320"},"modified":"2015-06-01T11:05:35","modified_gmt":"2015-06-01T15:05:35","slug":"patriot-act-expires-as-paul-blocks-final-vote-on-nsa-reform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2015\/06\/01\/patriot-act-expires-as-paul-blocks-final-vote-on-nsa-reform\/","title":{"rendered":"Patriot Act expires as Paul blocks final vote on NSA reform"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Senate advanced legislation 77-17 to reform the National Security Agency on Sunday, but parts of the Patriot Act will nonetheless lapse for a few days amid opposition from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).<\/p>\n

The legislation, called the USA Freedom Act, will not reach President Obama\u2019s desk until after the three measures expire at midnight, meaning that the provisions will expire until the bill is passed by the Senate and signed by Obama later this week.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Patriot Act will expire\u00a0tonight,\u201d Paul declared triumphantly from the Senate floor during a rare\u00a0Sunday\u00a0evening vote. \u201cIt will only be temporary. They will ultimately get their way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Obama has supported the measure and had repeatedly urged lawmakers to support it in the days leading up to\u00a0Sunday\u2019s deadline. The bill needed 60 votes in order to advance.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Senate took an important\u2014if late\u2014step forward tonight,\u201d White House spokesman Josh Earnest said in a statement late Sunday. \u201cWe call on the Senate to ensure this irresponsible lapse in authorities is as short-lived as possible. On a matter as critical as our national security, individual Senators must put aside their partisan motivations and act swiftly. The American people deserve nothing less.\u201d<\/p>\n

A failed gambit by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) opened the door to Paul\u2019s use of procedural tactics to delay consideration of the bill.<\/p>\n

Paul had made the spying programs unearthed by former government contractor Edward Snowden a central part of his presidential candidacy and vowed to force the expiration of the Patriot Act heading into the weekend.<\/p>\n

Paul argues the USA Freedom Act \u2014\u00a0which was approved by the House 338-88 earlier in May \u2014\u00a0does not go far enough to rein in spying programs that he and his allies argue are unconstitutional.<\/p>\n

\u201cAre we going to so blithely give up our freedom? Are we going to so blindly go along and take it?\u201d Paul said in heated remarks on the Senate floor before the vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to take it anymore,\u201d he declared, as his voice rose to a shout. \u201cI don\u2019t think the American people are going to take it anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Paul \u2014\u00a0who had roughly two dozen supporters crowding the gallery of the Senate in red \u201cStand with Rand\u201d t-shirts \u2014 appeared to declare victory after the vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn’t have 60 votes before to end the bulk collection,\u201d he told reporters after emerging from the chamber. \u201cBy slowing the process down, talking about the Patriot Act, we now will end bulk collection of records by the government.\u201d<\/p>\n

McConnell introduced a handful of amendments Sunday evening on behalf of himself and Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.). Paul and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has also attempted to bring up amendments of their own, but they were blocked.<\/p>\n

Paul\u2019s opposition will push votes on both those amendments and the final bill back to\u00a0Tuesday\u00a0at the earliest, and potentially Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The House would then either need to vote on the new bill or hash out the details in a conference committee.<\/p>\n

Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) \u2014 an NSA critic \u2014 warned senators against adding amendments to the legislation that could potentially weaken the bill in the eyes of its supporters.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the House side there’s not support for a more watered down version of the Freedom Act,\u201d he said. \u201cIf they want to get something passed through the House they need to make it better not worse.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tensions between Paul and other Senate Republicans were evident throughout Sunday\u2019s proceedings \u2014 particularly when the Kentucky Republican sought to speak in opposition to the bill when Sens. Dan Coates (R-Ind.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) were holding the floor.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe senator from Kentucky needs to learn the rules of the Senate,\u201d McCain said.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe the senator from Kentucky should know the rules of the Senate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Paul a little more than a week ago blocked the Senate from considering a short-term extension of the Patriot Act, which also could have prevented a lapse in the program if the House had found a way to consider it.<\/p>\n

Paul at the time blocked motions by McConnell, his Kentucky colleague, who had sought to win the short-term extension. The clash was remarkable given McConnell\u2019s support of Paul\u2019s presidential bid.<\/p>\n

Source: Patriot Act expires as Paul blocks final vote on NSA reform<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Senate advanced legislation 77-17 to reform the National Security Agency on Sunday, but parts of the Patriot Act will nonetheless lapse for a few days amid opposition from Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.). The legislation, called the USA Freedom Act, will not reach President Obama\u2019s desk until after the three measures expire at midnight, meaning that the provisions will expire until the bill is passed by the Senate and signed by Obama later this week. \u201cThe Patriot Act will expire\u00a0tonight,\u201d Paul declared triumphantly from the Senate floor during a rare\u00a0Sunday\u00a0evening vote. \u201cIt will only be temporary. They will ultimately get their way.\u201d Obama has supported the measure and had repeatedly urged lawmakers to support it in the days leading up to\u00a0Sunday\u2019s deadline. The bill needed 60 votes in order to advance. \u201cThe Senate took an important\u2014if late\u2014step forward tonight,\u201d White House spokesman Josh Earnest said in a statement late Sunday. \u201cWe call on the Senate to ensure this irresponsible lapse in authorities is as short-lived as possible. On a matter as critical as our national security, individual Senators must put aside their partisan motivations and act swiftly. The American people deserve nothing less.\u201d A failed gambit by Senate Majority Leader […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[1245,1300,1425],"class_list":["post-9320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-politics","tag-nsa","tag-patriot-act","tag-rand-paul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9320\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.megalextoria.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}