Updated June 2, 2015 1:27 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON—The Senate prepared to vote Tuesday afternoon on changes to a House bill curbing a government surveillance program in a push that could kick off a new legislative struggle over Patriot Act provisions that have already lapsed.
Senate Republicans were divided over whether to alter the House bill that would end the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of phone records, shifting storage of the records to phone companies. Earlier Tuesday, the Senate voted 83-14 to end debate on the bill, which is expected to pass the chamber potentially later in the day.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) and his allies are pushing to slow the transfer of the surveillance program’s record keeping to the phone companies to ensure the new system is fully working before the government’s role wanes. But any changes made by the Senate would have to be approved by the House, where senior lawmakers have warned they could siphon support for the bill, known as the U.S.A. Freedom Act.
“If the Senate changes it, it would challenge us,” House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) said Tuesday. “The best way to make sure America is protected is for the Senate to pass the USA Freedom Act.”
Some Republicans worried that the amendments could trigger a lengthy back-and-forth with the House, preventing a timely reauthorization of provisions of the Patriot Act that expired Sunday at midnight.
“I can accept those amendments,” said Sen. Jeff Flake (R., Ariz.), who said he was still deciding whether to vote for the measures. “I even feel more comfortable with them, but I don’t want this [bill] to be pinged back from the House.”
But the House qualms hadn’t persuaded some Senate Republicans to drop their efforts to alter the House bill.
“Since when did the United States Senate outsource its decision-making to the other body across the Capitol?” Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R., Texas) said on the Senate floor Tuesday. “The Senate should not be a rubber stamp for the House or vice versa.”
The most contentious amendment, from Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R., N.C.), would lengthen the transition of the surveillance program to the phone companies to 12 months, longer than the House bill’s six-month transition period. Mr. Burr had initially proposed a two-year shift to ensure there would be enough time to develop the new system under the phone companies.
But House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R., Va.) and the panel’s top Democrat, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, as well as two other key lawmakers, on Monday rejected the changes proposed to the House bill. The House easily passed its bill in a bipartisan 338-88 vote last month.
“These amendments only serve to weaken the House-passed bill and postpone timely enactment of legislation that responsibly protects national security while enhancing civil-liberty protections,” the four lawmakers said in a statement. “The House is not likely to accept the changes proposed.”
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R., Calif.) said in an interview Monday that none of the amendments would cause operational problems with the House bill.
“I personally have no problems with the amendments,” Mr. Nunes said. “We need to get the program back up and going. Having the program shut down is not a good place to be if we’re worried about the safety of our citizens.”
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Monday the lapse in surveillance authorities, however brief, has made the country vulnerable to “unnecessary risk,” although he played down the notion that the U.S. is now less safe.
“The Senate’s failure to act introduces unnecessary risk to the country and to our citizens,” Mr. Earnest said, adding that the expiration of the Patriot Act has limited the tools “our national security professionals can use to keep us safe.”
He said the Senate amendment to extend the implementation time for transferring the telephone records to phone companies is “completely unnecessary.”
“We are confident that that six-month time period would give our national security professionals ample time to implement these reforms,” Mr. Earnest said. “But if for some reason that amount of time is judged to be insufficient, the president’s directed his national security team to go back to Congress and ask for additional time.”
The Senate amendments represent the last efforts from Messrs. Burr and McConnell to alter some of the changes imposed by a bill they had opposed until Sunday night. Mr. McConnell, who had hoped to extend the Patriot Act for five years, conceded Sunday that the Senate would have to advance the House measure, which cleared a procedural hurdle in a 77-17 vote.
In particular, Mr. McConnell has worried the House bill wouldn’t require phone companies to retain the phone-record information that could help authorities spot terrorist activity.
Telephone companies already are required in some instances to retain records for 18 months, though policies aren’t clear-cut. An Obama administration official said the White House would notify Congress if any phone companies change their data-retention practices.
One amendment the Senate will vote on Tuesday will require phone companies to notify the government if they plan to hold on to phone records data for fewer than 18 months. The measure would also ask the Director of National Intelligence to review the surveillance program after the transition to ensure it can operate.
“Before scrapping an effective system that has helped protect us from attack in favor of an untried one, we should at least work toward securing some modest degree of assurance that the new system can, in fact, actually work,” Mr. McConnell said on the Senate floor Tuesday.
—Siobhan Hughes contributed to this article.
Write to Kristina Peterson at kristina.peterson@wsj.com and Carol E. Lee at carol.lee@wsj.com
WASHINGTON—The Senate prepared to vote Tuesday afternoon on changes to a House bill curbing a government surveillance program in a push that could kick off a new legislative struggle over Patriot Act provisions that have already lapsed.
Senate Republicans were divided over whether to alter the House bill that would end the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of phone records, shifting storage of the records to phone companies. Earlier Tuesday, the Senate voted 83-14 to end debate on the bill, which is expected to pass the chamber potentially later in the day.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) and his allies are pushing to slow the transfer of the surveillance program’s record keeping to the phone companies to ensure the new system is fully working before the government’s role wanes. But any changes made by the Senate would have to be approved by the House, where senior lawmakers have warned they could siphon support for the bill, known as the U.S.A. Freedom Act.
“If the Senate changes it, it would challenge us,” House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) said Tuesday. “The best way to make sure America is protected is for the Senate to pass the USA Freedom Act.”
Some Republicans worried that the amendments could trigger a lengthy back-and-forth with the House, preventing a timely reauthorization of provisions of the Patriot Act that expired Sunday at midnight.
“I can accept those amendments,” said Sen. Jeff Flake (R., Ariz.), who said he was still deciding whether to vote for the measures. “I even feel more comfortable with them, but I don’t want this [bill] to be pinged back from the House.”
But the House qualms hadn’t persuaded some Senate Republicans to drop their efforts to alter the House bill.
“Since when did the United States Senate outsource its decision-making to the other body across the Capitol?” Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R., Texas) said on the Senate floor Tuesday. “The Senate should not be a rubber stamp for the House or vice versa.”
The most contentious amendment, from Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R., N.C.), would lengthen the transition of the surveillance program to the phone companies to 12 months, longer than the House bill’s six-month transition period. Mr. Burr had initially proposed a two-year shift to ensure there would be enough time to develop the new system under the phone companies.
But House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R., Va.) and the panel’s top Democrat, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, as well as two other key lawmakers, on Monday rejected the changes proposed to the House bill. The House easily passed its bill in a bipartisan 338-88 vote last month.
“These amendments only serve to weaken the House-passed bill and postpone timely enactment of legislation that responsibly protects national security while enhancing civil-liberty protections,” the four lawmakers said in a statement. “The House is not likely to accept the changes proposed.”
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R., Calif.) said in an interview Monday that none of the amendments would cause operational problems with the House bill.
“I personally have no problems with the amendments,” Mr. Nunes said. “We need to get the program back up and going. Having the program shut down is not a good place to be if we’re worried about the safety of our citizens.”
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Monday the lapse in surveillance authorities, however brief, has made the country vulnerable to “unnecessary risk,” although he played down the notion that the U.S. is now less safe.
“The Senate’s failure to act introduces unnecessary risk to the country and to our citizens,” Mr. Earnest said, adding that the expiration of the Patriot Act has limited the tools “our national security professionals can use to keep us safe.”
He said the Senate amendment to extend the implementation time for transferring the telephone records to phone companies is “completely unnecessary.”
“We are confident that that six-month time period would give our national security professionals ample time to implement these reforms,” Mr. Earnest said. “But if for some reason that amount of time is judged to be insufficient, the president’s directed his national security team to go back to Congress and ask for additional time.”
The Senate amendments represent the last efforts from Messrs. Burr and McConnell to alter some of the changes imposed by a bill they had opposed until Sunday night. Mr. McConnell, who had hoped to extend the Patriot Act for five years, conceded Sunday that the Senate would have to advance the House measure, which cleared a procedural hurdle in a 77-17 vote.
In particular, Mr. McConnell has worried the House bill wouldn’t require phone companies to retain the phone-record information that could help authorities spot terrorist activity.
Telephone companies already are required in some instances to retain records for 18 months, though policies aren’t clear-cut. An Obama administration official said the White House would notify Congress if any phone companies change their data-retention practices.
One amendment the Senate will vote on Tuesday will require phone companies to notify the government if they plan to hold on to phone records data for fewer than 18 months. The measure would also ask the Director of National Intelligence to review the surveillance program after the transition to ensure it can operate.
“Before scrapping an effective system that has helped protect us from attack in favor of an untried one, we should at least work toward securing some modest degree of assurance that the new system can, in fact, actually work,” Mr. McConnell said on the Senate floor Tuesday.
—Siobhan Hughes contributed to this article.
Write to Kristina Peterson at kristina.peterson@wsj.com and Carol E. Lee at carol.lee@wsj.com
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