U.S. House of Representatives Passes Amendment to End NSA Backdoor Spying

On June 19, 2014, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 293-123 to pass an amendment to the Defense Appropriations bill to cut funding for NSA backdoor spying under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments. Current NSA practices include the collection of vast amounts of information and, provided that there is a foreign “target,” the NSA can search these collections for communications of U.S. persons, thus providing a “backdoor” method of conducting surveillance on Americans. This Amendment, originally primarily sponsored by Representatives Massie (R-KY), Sensenbrenner (R-WI) and Lofgren (D-CA), would restore Fourth Amendment protections by cutting funding of current NSA practices of conducting these warrantless searches.