Congress Can't Compromise on Privacy

[Commentary] With the understandable focus on the will-they-or-won't-they of congressional tax reform, one of the most important tasks facing Congress before year's end has garnered little national attention: reauthorization of the law that governs foreign intelligence surveillance on U.S. soil.  There is a growing sense in Congress that changes are needed to better protect Americans' privacy. One of the leading reform proposals is the USA Liberty Act, a bill introduced by a bipartisan group of House Judiciary Committee members that will be marked up in committee this week. But in a well-intentioned effort to pre-empt opposition by surveillance hard-liners, the bill's sponsors have adopted an approach that could paradoxically make Americans more vulnerable to surveillance in the future.

[Elizabeth Goitein is co-director of the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law.]