Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act

Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act

This act reauthorizes Title VII of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for two years and makes changes to FISA, including expanding restrictions on surveillance under Section 702. (Section 702 concerns acquiring communications of non-U.S. persons believed to be outside the United States to obtain foreign intelligence information. Information about U.S. persons may incidentally be acquired by this type of surveillance and subsequently searched or queried under certain circumstances.)

Changes to FISA include

requiring applications for electronic surveillance or a physical search under FISA to be supported by sworn statements and limiting the use of information derived from political organizations or media sources in such applications;

requiring any extension of an order for electronic surveillance under FISA targeting a U.S. person to be granted or denied by the same judge who issued the original order to the extent practicable and absent exigent circumstances;

providing that specified congressional leaders are entitled to attend any proceeding of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) or the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review (FISC-R) and that each such leader may also designate up to two staff members to attend on his or her behalf;

repealing the authority to resume abouts collection (i.e., intentionally acquiring communications that contain a reference to, but are not to or from, a target of acquisition authorized under section 702(a) of FISA);

increasing certain criminal and civil penalties related to FISA;

requiring adverse consequences (e.g., suspension without pay or removal) for federal government officers and employees who engage in intentional misconduct with respect to proceedings before the FISC or FISC-R;

expanding the definition of foreign intelligence information to include information related to the ability of the United States to protect against the international production, distribution, or financing of drugs driving overdose deaths (such as illicit synthetic drugs and opioids) or their precursors; and

expanding the definition of electronic communication service provider to include any service provider that has access to equipment that is being or may be used to transmit of store wire or electronic communications, but excluding entities that serve primarily as dwellings, food service establishments, community facilities, or public accommodation facilities.

The summary continues for 17 more paragraphs. Read it in full on Congress.gov

Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Public Law" stage on April 20, 2024. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.

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