3 Democratic Senators: ‘No Evidence’ NSA Phone Sweeps Are Useful
Three Democratic senators filed a brief in federal court on Tuesday supporting a lawsuit to end the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of phone records.
Sens. Mark Udall (Colo.), Ron Wyden (Ore.) and Martin Heinrich (N.M.), who all have access to classified information as members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, argued that the controversial program does little to combat terrorism.
“[The senators] have reviewed this surveillance extensively and have seen no evidence that the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records has provided any intelligence of value that could not have been gathered through less intrusive means,” lawyers for the lawmakers wrote.
They argued that more targeted surveillance programs could have been used to gather the same information that the NSA obtained through the phone data collection.