[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 9 (Tuesday, January 31, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S362-S363]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                       IMPROVING THE PATRIOT ACT

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, those of us working constructively and in a 
bipartisan way to extend the USA PATRIOT Act with improvements have 
repeatedly offered to meet to work out the remaining differences. 
Sadly, the Senate leadership has not made the effort to work through 
the remaining concerns or brought us together.
  I have continued meeting and talking with interested Republican and 
Democratic Senators. Senate staff has finally gotten together this week 
in a bipartisan meeting. I urge the majority leader to bring together 
key interested Senators to work out a bipartisan compromise that 
improves the failed conference report.
  A majority of Senators--Republicans and Democrats, those who voted 
against cloture on the conference report that failed to pass the Senate 
and those who voted for it urged the Republican leader to act on a 
short-term, 3-month extension before the end of the last session. 
Instead, he chose to proceed with a 6-month extension that Republicans 
in the House found objectionable. That led to the short extension that 
is about to expire this week. The President had said that he would not 
approve a short-term extension. House Republicans had said that they 
would not allow a short-term extension. But just before Christmas they 
demanded and enacted a shorter extension than anyone else had proposed.
  As soon as it became apparent that the conference report filed by the 
Republican leadership would be unacceptable to the Senate, I joined on 
Thursday, December 8, in urging a 3-month extension to work out a 
better bill. On the first day the Senate was next in session, Monday, 
December 12, Senator Sununu and I introduced such a bill, S.2082. We 
sent out a ``Dear Colleague'' letter to other Senators on December 13 
and that bipartisan bill was cosponsored by 46 other Senators. That 
bill would have extended the PATRIOT Act until March 31, 2006, to allow 
us all to work out the remaining differences and

[[Page S363]]

improve this reauthorization legislation in ways to better protect the 
rights of ordinary Americans. It proposed a commonsense solution to 
allow us to take a few more weeks to get this right for all Americans.
  Contrary to the false claims and misrepresentations by some, there 
was no effort on either side of the aisle to do away with the PATRIOT 
Act. That is just not true. Along with others here in the Senate, I am 
seeking to mend and extend the PATRIOT Act, not to end it. There is no 
reason why the American people cannot have a PATRIOT Act that is both 
effective and that adequately protects their rights and their privacy. 
The only people who were threatening an expiration of the PATRIOT Act 
were the President and House Republicans. As I noted on December 21, 
the administration and the Republican congressional leadership were the 
ones who were objecting to extending the act and threatening to have it 
expire. That was wrong. That made no sense. They came to their senses 
in the days that followed. But now, as we approach the expiration of 
the current extension this Friday, the Republican congressional 
leadership has taken no further action and we risk sections of the 
PATRIOT Act expiring, again.
  Republican and Democratic Senators joined together last month to say 
we can do better to protect Americans' liberties while ensuring our 
national security is as strong as it can be. In the days after 9/11 we 
acted as Americans, not Democrats, not Republicans. The President's 
political adviser Karl Rove and the rest of those who are seeking to 
make the PATRIOT Act a partisan political issue should instead join 
with our bipartisan coalition and work with us to provide a better 
balance to protect the rights of Americans.
  Every single Senator--Republican and Democratic--voted last July to 
mend and extend the PATRIOT Act. That bipartisan solution was cast 
aside by the Bush administration and Republican congressional leaders 
when they hijacked the conference report, rewrote the bill in ways that 
fell short in protecting basic civil liberties and then tried to ram it 
through Congress as an all-or-nothing proposition. I have joined with 
Senators of both parties in an effort to work to improve the bill. Some 
of us are working hard to protect the security and liberty of 
Americans. What is wrong is for the White House to manipulate this into 
a partisan fight for its partisan political advantage. Instead of 
playing partisan politics, the Bush administration and Republican 
congressional leadership should join in trying to improve the law.
  This is a vital debate. The terrorist threat to America's security is 
very real, and it is vital that we be armed with the tools needed to 
protect Americans' security. At the same time, however, the threat to 
civil liberties is also very real in America today. The question is not 
whether the Government should have the tools it needs to protect the 
American people. Of course it should. That is why I coauthored the 
PATRIOT Act 5 years ago, and that is why that Act passed with broad 
bipartisan support. When I voted for the PATRIOT Act, I did not think 
it was an ideal piece of legislation, and I knew that it would need 
careful oversight and, in due course, reform. None of us wants the 
PATRIOT Act to expire, and those who threatened to let it expire rather 
than fix it play a dangerous game.
  This is about how to reconcile two shared and fundamental goals--
ensuring the safety of the American people and protecting their liberty 
by means of a system of checks and balances that keeps the Government--
their Government--accountable. Those goals are not the goals of any 
particular party or ideology; they are shared American goals. How to 
balance security with liberty and Government accountability was the 
most fundamental dilemma with which the Framers of our Constitution 
wrestled, and how to adjust that balance in the post-9/11 world is a 
fundamental dilemma before this Congress.
  Our Nation is a democracy, founded on the principles of balanced 
government. We need to restore checks and balances in this country to 
protect us all and all that we hold dear. Our Congress and our courts 
provide checks on the abuse of executive authority and should protect 
our liberties. Congress must write the law so it provides not just a 
check on Presidential power but also a clear role for the courts. All 
Americans need to take notice and need to demand that their liberties 
be maintained. We can do better and must do better for the American 
people.

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