Spy Powers Authorization Is on the Bottom of Congress’s Busy To-Do List

The debate around whether to extend a law that allows U.S. intelligence officials to surveil foreign actors abroad is fracturing both parties in both chambers of Congress — and Congress has little room on its priority list to deal with it.

Republican leaders and national security officials want a clean extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, a position they say is backed by President Donald Trump. The law is intended to allow the U.S. to surveil foreign threats, but Democrats, like Sen. Dick Durbin, and some conservatives, like Sen. Mike Lee, want more explicit legal protections for Americans who get swept up in the intelligence searches.

Despite the fast approaching April 20 deadline to renew FISA, Congress has other priorities that are complicating its pathway to renewal.

“Fortunately, there’s nothing else going on that would draw our attention, and we can concentrate on that on the floor,” Sen. Josh Hawley, who supports adding new privacy protections, joked to NOTUS when asked about progress on the extension.

Lawmakers’ list of to-dos, especially in the Senate, keeps growing. The upper chamber has been tied up this week debating a voter ID bill, which Trump has explicitly said is his top priority. The Department of Homeland Security has been shut down for more than a month, and negotiations to reopen it are ongoing. The Senate is now considering the nomination of Sen. Markwayne Mullin to the role of secretary of DHS. And senators are currently scheduled to leave at the end of next week for a two-week recess.

With weeks to go, reauthorizing the surveillance authority is on the back burner, at least for now.

“There’s very solid support for 702, but in the Senate, it takes more time to simply work your way through if anybody has a disagreement,” Sen. Mike Rounds said, using shorthand for the FISA law set to lapse. “We know there’s a couple of fellows in the Senate that have always had a disagreement with 702, and think there’s a better way to do it.”

That group includes both Democrats and Republicans who are pushing to close loopholes and expand the supervision of queries under Section 702 that might include Americans’ data.

Lee is the main driver among Senate Republicans for further safeguards to prevent warrantless searching of Americans’ communications.

“I’m definitely one of those least comfortable with just a clean extension,” he said. “There are a number of us. It’s not yet clear how that will shake out, in part because it’s not yet clear what the president himself may say.”

Lee told NOTUS that in his conversations with the president, Trump has not indicated a preference for a clean extension. In a statement to NOTUS, a White House official said that “the administration is strongly seeking a clean extension.”

White House officials have also publicly pushed an 18-month extension to Congress. Intelligence chiefs told a House panel in a hearing this week that “the president is in favor” of the clean, 18-month extension, and that they would support it. CIA Director John Ratcliffe said he’d prefer a longer extension.

The law was last renewed in 2024, when Congress added some reforms like increasing training and oversight for intelligence and law enforcement officers making search queries about data.

Now, Democrats critical of Trump’s intelligence leaders and Republicans concerned about privacy want to add more safeguards that limit agencies’ abilities to sweep up Americans in their investigations.

Lawmakers from both parties NOTUS spoke to in recent weeks are still in the early stages of forming their positions on whether to add reforms. In 2024, the extension squeaked through the Senate with exactly 60 votes and a bipartisan coalition against it. Hammering out consensus before this deadline is going to take time.

Meanwhile, House Republican leadership is aiming to pass a clean extension next week of the surveillance authority law, according to a leadership source familiar with the planning.

Speaker Mike Johnson said in a press conference this week that he is gunning for the clean, 18-month extension.

“Now, why would we go that route? Because you remember last time it was up for reauthorization, we instituted 56 substantive reforms to FISA,” Johnson said. “By every measure and review, those are working just as we planned.”

That will likely cause procedural headaches for him, since many Democrats and several Republicans in the House have also stated their opposition to moving a clean extension forward without amendments.

Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said at a press conference this week that the House Democratic Caucus has not settled on one clear message for the Section 702 vote. Some, including Rep. Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, don’t want to let the authority lapse since it would endanger current intelligence operations.

“It’s not that I see the value in a renewal. If this authority is allowed to expire, it will be devastating,” Himes said this week. “I think if the Republicans can pass a rule, big if, I think this passes with good, strong bipartisan support.”

But Himes and other Democrats say they have no confidence in the administration and want any opportunity to rein it in further. Rep. Jamie Raskin sent an open letter to the caucus Thursday urging his colleagues to oppose the clean extension, arguing that he does not trust the administration to use it responsibly.

“To trust that any recent reforms are working, we would have to take President Trump at his word,” Raskin wrote. “We would have to take at face value the representations of an Administration that routinely violates Americans’ constitutional rights, lies to federal judges, and defies court orders.”

Raskin said he wants to see more reforms to FISA that add independent guardrails. In the meantime, he said he would vote against proceeding to a clean extension.

“What you can expect is that every single Democrat will oppose the rule, and then we’ll see where we go from there,” Jeffries said.

On the Republican side, like in the Senate, a coalition of conservatives, including members of the House Freedom Caucus, say that the law as it is doesn’t include enough privacy protections for Americans.

“There are still concerns among constituents that Fourth Amendment rights of Americans are not adequately protected,” Rep. Andy Harris, the chair of the Freedom Caucus, said. “So I think those concerns should be taken into account.”

“Some version of FISA is necessary upon the expiration,” Harris said. “I think that’s what the discussion has to be, exactly what version we want to extend.”