Rand Paul: ‘The Deep State Needs More Oversight’

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) delivered a fiery speech on the Senate floor Wednesday, contending that the “deep state needs more oversight.”

Sen. Paul delivered a speech on the Senate floor on Wednesday, contending that Congress needs more oversight power over the American government’s secret drone program which would allow the government to “to kill anyone, anywhere, anytime” and serves as “an ominous power.”

Paul suggested the program has a lack of checks and balances.

The Kentucky conservative slammed the fact that the intelligence community informs only a select few members of Congress and that the intel community usually only tells them after the fact.

“What happens is you get imperfect and not very good oversight,” Sen. Paul said on the Senate floor. “The checks and balances are not working because the only people being told about what the intelligence community is doing are the people who are rubber stamps for what they are doing.”

Sen. Paul mentioned that he has yet to receive answers regarding his concerns over the American government’s drone program over whether the government kills people around the world based on bulk collection of metadata.

Paul also called for greater accountability to America’s drone program.

“I believe that we shouldn’t kill anyone, anywhere, anytime around the world without some checks and balances,” Paul said.

“I also believe that our drone program, our targeted killing, actually makes the country less safe and makes us more at risk for terrorism,” Sen. Paul contended.

Sen. Paul also led the charge in passing a resolution last week disapproving America’s backing of Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen.

Paul, as well as Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT), Chris Murphy (D-CT), and Bernie Sanders (I-VT), led a bipartisan populist coalition calling for America to re-examine its role in Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen.

The Kentucky conservative called it an “extraordinary moment” for the country.

“I think it is an extraordinary moment because for decades, maybe for 50 or 60 years, Congress has been relinquishing and abdicating their power to indicate whether the country is at war,” Paul told Breitbart News in an exclusive statement last week.

“So this is a big step and it is a big majority voting to say you know what? Declaration of war comes from Congress and we don’t approve of the war in Yemen now.” Paul said. “So that is a big step and it really came across the aisle, both sides coming together. It’s a pretty big deal. … The historic nature of this being the first time since Vietnam is huge.”