House Rules Committee Sets Debate For USA Freedom Act

The House Rules Committee has set the rules for the House floor debate of the USA Freedom Act (H.R. 3361).

The bill, which passed unanimously out of the Judiciary Committee would end bulk data collection by the National Security Agency, as well as boost transparency and reporting requirements for targeted data requests, require more specificity in those requests, and minimize retention and dissemination of nonpublic data.

The bill now goes to the House floor for one hour of debate, 40 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of Judiciary, and 20 minutes divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. It could be scheduled for that House vote as early as May 21 according to the office of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), which has it on the calendar for "possible consideration."

There will be a mix of Republican and Democratic amendments to consider, including ones that would allow intelligence agencies to negotiate with telephone companies to store call record details for national security purposes, one that could require the government provide the public with the total number of requests for data and the number of individuals affected, requires probable cause for data searches, and prevents intelligence agencies from mandating that a device manufacturer, software developer, or standards organization build in a backdoor to circumvent encryption or privacy protections of their products.