'I Have Been to the Darkest Corners of Government, and What They Fear Is Light'

[JDPriestly]

206. No. Congress did not make all of what the NSA is doing legal.

If you recall yesterday or so, Feinstein published an e-mail from Snowden to the general counsel of the NSA. It concerned the legal basis for the NSA programs. Snowden suggests that he was informed that the basis for it was an executive order.

Snowden asks whether the authority of executive order supersedes a statute passed by Congress. The general counsel answers without denying that the NSA programs comply not with an Act of Congress but with an executive order.

http://www.businessinsider.com/snowden-interview-brian-williams-email-nsa-general-counsel-2014-5

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/edward-snowden-says-email-released-by-nsa-is-incomplete/

Read the actual e-mail. It's hard for someone with no background to understand, but Snowden was cautiously questioning the authority for the NSA's programs.

Members of the Congressional committee that passed some of this legislation have criticized the NSA's interpretation of one of the statutory provisions that the NSA claimed justifies its programs. \

"p. Jim Sensenbrenner sent another warning shot Tuesday to members of the intelligence community that they risk losing all congressional authority for the National Security Agency's collection of bulk telephone records if his bill restricting the program is not passed.

Sensenbrenner, a Wisconsin Republican, told Deputy Attorney General James Cole during a House Judiciary Committee hearing that Congress will not reauthorize Section 215 of the post-9/11 Patriot Act before it sunsets on June 1, 2015, if substantial reforms to government surveillance are not adopted by then. The NSA derives much of its surveillance power from that section of the law. He added that Congress would never have passed or twice reauthorized the Patriot Act, which he authored, had it known the full breadth of the NSA's surveillance muscle.

"Unless Section 215 gets fixed, you, Mr. Cole, and the intelligence community will get absolutely nothing, because I am confident there are not the votes in this Congress to reauthorize it," Sensenbrenner said. "And I can say that without qualification.""

http://www.nextgov.com/big-data/2014/02/patriot-act-architect-no-more-spying-unless-my-nsa-reform-bill-passes/78164/