Trump throws support behind renewing intelligence powers

President Donald Trump on Wednesday threw his support behind an effort to renew a key surveillance provision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

"Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune have been working to pass a clean extension of FISA Section 702, a Law that was passed many years ago by Congress to collect Intelligence on Foreigners and Noncitizens," Trump posted Truth Social. "When used properly, FISA is an effective tool to keep Americans safe. For these reasons, I have called for a clean 18-month extension, HOWEVER, the Critical and Common Sense Reforms that were made in the last Reauthorization of FISA must remain intact to protect the American People from abuses."

Section 702 has attracted scrutiny from privacy advocates due to the provisions allowing intelligence agencies to store information on American citizens obtained while surveilling a foreigner, without a warrant. The Section 702 database, for instance, includes such information and is accessible by nearly every agency, albeit with some safeguards.

"Nobody understands this better than me, as I was a victim of the worst and most illegal abuse of FISA in our Nation’s History, by Radical Left Lunatics who lied to the FISA Court to spy on my 2016 Presidential Campaign in their attempt to RIG the Election in favor of Crooked Hillary Clinton," Trump added. "That is why, since the first day of my already Historic Second Term, my Administration has worked tirelessly to ensure these Reforms are being aggressively executed at every level of the Executive Branch to keep Americans safe, while protecting their sacred Civil Liberties guaranteed by our Great Constitution."

"With the ongoing successful Military activities against the Terrorist Iranian Regime, it is more important than ever that we remain vigilant, PROTECT our Homeland, Troops, and Diplomats stationed abroad, and maintain our ability to quickly stop bad actors seeking to cause harm to our People and our Country," he went on. "The fact is, whether you like FISA or not, it is extremely important to our Military. I have spoken to many Generals about this, and they consider it vital. Not one said, even tacitly, that they can do without it — especially right now with our brilliant Military Operation in Iran."

Ben Whedon is the Chief Political Correspondent at Just the News. Follow him on X.