Former President Donald Trump was critical of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) while speaking at a joint press conference Friday at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA).
When asked by a reporter, “Do you support the House’s FISA bill [inaudible]…” Trump said, “I’m not a big fan of FISA.”
“I looked at it, and I studied it, and I know it probably better than anybody. You know, they spied on my campaign. You do know that, right? And they did lots of other bad things,” Trump said.
He added that the legislation would time out in two years, which would be in the middle of his second administration should he win back the White House:
They put a lot of checks and balances on it and I guess it’s down to two years now, so that it would come due in the early part of my administration on the basis that we live up to the polls, because all the polls – we just had another one come out, we’re leading by a lot, but it comes up quickly. I said, “You do what you want.” But I’m not a big fan of FISA. I think it’s terrible.
The meeting, which focused on election integrity, came hours after 86 House Republicans shot down an amendment – which would have required warrants to surveil Americans’ communications – to a bill called the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act (RISAA) that would reauthorize Section 702 of FISA.
As Breitbart News Policy reporter Sean Moran pointed out in an article Friday, “Section 702 is a law that is meant to target foreign adversaries, but often surveils Americans’ private communications without a warrant.”
Fox News White House Correspondent Jacquie Heinrich noted Wednesday that Section 702 is separate from FISA Title 1, which “was used to improperly surveil Trump campaign associate Carter Page in 2016.”
FISA Title 1 is also a permanent law and does not come up for renewal as Section 702 does, per Heinrich.
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