Sputnik — Sessions, Coats Push For US Government Surveillance Powers to Become Permanent

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions and National Intelligence Director Daniel Coats want the US Congress to permanently empower the federal government to carry out warrantless surveillance of foreign targets, according to a letter they sent to lawmakers.

"We are writing to urge that the Congress promptly reauthorize, in clean and permanent form, Title VII of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), enacted by the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 (FAA)," Sessions and Coats wrote in their letter on Monday.

Title VII, which is set to expire at the end of the year, gives the US National Security Agency nearly unchecked power to monitor foreign targets, as well as Americans' international communications. The legislation has been used as the legal basis for surveillance programs disclosed by Edward Snowden in 2013....

Sliding down the slippery slope toward the Gestapo, Stasi, and KGB. 

The next step will be making the Patriot Act and suspension of constitutional liberties permanent, too, solidifying the police state and surveillance state. 

G. W. Bush: "If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator."

But, hey, it can't happen here. This is a free country.
Sputnik International
Sessions, Coats Push For US Government Surveillance Powers to Become Permanent