Sen. Paul Issues Response to FBI Correspondence on Drones
July 25, 2013 in Politics & Elections
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Sen. Rand Paul today issued a follow-up letter to the Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding his concern over the use of FBI surveillance drones on U.S. soil.
Sen. Paul initiated correspondence on June 20, with a letter to Director Robert Mueller that included questions regarding the FBI’s governance policy on using drones on American soil.
After receiving no response from Director Mueller for weeks, on July 9, Sen. Paul sent a second letter to Director Mueller requesting immediate action to address his questions.
The director of legislative affairs at the FBI recently sent two responses, one classified and one unclassified, to answer Sen. Paul’s concerns. The content of the classified letter cannot be disclosed publicly, but a copy of the unclassified response can be found HERE.
The answers included in both letters were not sufficient to answering all of Sen. Paul’s questions, prompting him to send the following correspondence to the FBI this afternoon.
LETTER TEXT:
July 25, 2013
Robert S. Mueller
Director
Federal Bureau of Investigation
U.S. Department of Justice
935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20535-0001
Dear Director Mueller,
I appreciate the response I received to my questions (from my letter dated July 9, 2013) relating to the agency’s use of drones, and also for your continued cooperation in communicating the rules and procedures that govern their use. Based on your reply, though, I did want to convey a follow-up question which I believe is important to the application of individual protections from warrantless government surveillance.
The FBI’s unclassified response letter maintained that the Bureau would acquire a warrant before using a drone to acquire information when an individual has a reasonable expectation of privacy. While I agree that warrants should be used to approve information collection-including information collected through drone surveillance-this protection could be undercut by the Bureau’s interpretation of what constitutes a ‘reasonable expectation of privacy.’
Of note, the Bureau’s response also mentions that ‘there has been no need’ to seek a warrant or court order to use a drone in past examples. Instead of seeking court orders, the Bureau defers to an internal approval process it uses to protect privacy. Given that, first, the FBI will only seek a warrant if a reasonable expectation of privacy is assumed and, second, that the FBI has not felt it necessary to seek a warrant during past drone operations, it is important that you clarify your interpretation of …read more
Source: RAND PAUL
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