Over 10,000 FBI Agents Can Access Data From Secretive Surveillance Program: Inspectors General

Get ready for a shocking revelation! More than 10,000 federal employees could have access to data revealed by a secretive government surveillance program that has come under scrutiny because of alleged abuses. Lawmakers were told by U.S. inspectors general at an April 27 House Judiciary subcommittee hearing.

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)

The legislation gives intelligence agencies broad powers to conduct surveillance on foreigners suspected of spying for a foreign power or belonging to a terrorist group. However, bipartisan concerns have been raised because the program also has the ability to collect information about U.S. citizens.

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) Queries Panelists

During the hearing, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) queried panelists about how many FBI agents could have access to FISA-acquired data. A court-ordered report released in May 2022 revealed that the FBI had made more than 3.3 million queries of Americans under FISA authority. This, in turn, prompted a crisis of confidence in the FBI’s respect for civil liberties among members of both parties. In his questioning, Gaetz referenced that report.

Addressing each of the three panelists, Gaetz asked, “If I represent to you that we believe there may be north of 10,000 people in the federal government who can perform [FISA] queries, would anyone here have a basis to disagree with that?” All three answered in the negative.

In a Twitter post featuring a clip of the exchange, House Judiciary Republicans said, “Upwards of 10,000 FBI personnel may have access to section 702-acquired FISA data. 10,000! Why’s that number so big?”

Alleged Abuses

The program in question, FISA section 702, has been scrutinized for its alleged abuses. Aside from the incidents uncovered in 2021, the intelligence community (IC) has repeatedly failed audits of its use of FISA.

In 2019, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz investigated a random sampling of 29 FISA cases by the FBI. None of the 29 cases chosen were found to be legitimate.

The FISA is overseen by the FISA court, a secretive body that grants spying authority to U.S. intelligence agents. To make a FISA query of U.S. citizens, the FBI and other law enforcement agents are legally required to receive the approval of the closed-door FISA court.

In his investigation, Horowitz found that none of the 29 randomly chosen queries had been carried out properly or legally. Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) said from an earlier conversation with Horowitz that in 25 of the cases, “there was unsupported, uncorroborated, or inconsistent information.” The FBI couldn’t even produce the relevant investigative files in the other four.

“In those 29 applications that were reviewed, the inspector general found over 400 instances of noncompliance with the Woods Procedures,” Biggs said, referencing FBI procedures requiring that FISA requests be “scrupulously accurate.”

Since 2021, the FBI has reduced illegal queries by about 90 percent, according to FBI Director Christopher Wray.

Specifically, the authority for these searches was granted by FISA section 702, an amendment added to the bill’s original text in 2008. That section gave the U.S. intelligence community the power to gather information on foreign agents “reasonably believed to be operating outside the United States.”

But section 702 also gives the IC the ability to make “incidental queries,” queries of U.S. citizens who have communicated with a suspected foreign agent—an authority that lawmakers say is anti-Fourth Amendment.

“Unfortunately for the intelligence community, we have a Fourth Amendment,” Biggs said in his opening remarks.

The House Oversight Committee has a six-member working group trying to hammer out a reformed section 702, which will expire on Dec. 31, 2023, without congressional reauthorization. But during the hearing, Biggs indicated his belief that section 702 may “already [be] beyond repair.”

“FISA section 702 explicitly states tha