Action 1: Check out how your legislator voted on the bill renewing mass surveillance, and hold them accountable

The politics of surveillance cross partisan lines. We have a Republican President, but over 60 House Republicans and over 20 Senate Republicans voted for surveillance reform. Most House Democrats supported strong reforms, but their leadership did not. Making this issue about party is the first error.

But when it comes to individuals, it's worth checking, and knowing, which of your legislators are your friends on this issue, and holding them accountable. Check out the roll call votes for House and Senate, and consider supporting challengers to those who voted to continue the loss of our precious liberties.

The House vote on the USA RIGHTS Act amendment, which would have turned the renewal into real reform: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2018/roll014.xml
The House vote on final passage of S. 139, the surveillance renewal: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2018/roll016.xml
The Senate vote on cloture (whether to close debate) on S. 139 - 60 votes meant that debate closed, which ensured its passage: https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=115&session=2&vote=00011 (Note: This vote is listed as being for the "Rapid DNA Act", but that act's text was erased and replaced with S. 139 to smooth passage of 702 renewal.)

Action 2: Disentangling your community and state from the FBI, DOJ and ICE

Looking to the longer term, our best strategies are local, legal, technical and electoral. Legally, our Litigation Working Group of volunteer attorneys, law professors and law students is more active than ever, filing amicus briefs in Fourth Amendment cases. From a technical perspective, we should all be encouraging the adoption of end-to-end encrypted tools by our networks. Electorally, we are exploring setting up a PAC to help fund the campaigns of people who challenge the surveillance state. But let's focus for a moment onwhat we want to achieve locally in the context of a federal government intent on prying ever more deeply into people's lives.

With digitization, and after 9/11, came a wave of data-sharing agreements between local police, fusion centers, private security-grifting companies, and federal agencies, especially the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force, ICE and the DEA. These data-sharing practices are modifiable at the local and state levels through sustained public pressure. For example, the Oakland Privacy Group just secured an agreement from the Oakland City Council that city agencies would not share information with ICE; in San Francisco, local police are now barred from joint operations with the Joint Terrorism Task Force; and our efforts continue to pass surveillance oversight ordinances in many parts of the country.

These ordinances are crucial ways to protect people in our communities, on left or right, who dissent from the economic and social status quo. We, as Restore The Fourth activists, can work to grow and spread these ordinances, making local communities more autonomous with respect to the surveillance state.

Action 3: Focus on the "Border"

This month, we are introducing a new focus in our news links, on borders, immigration and the rights of non-US persons. Given the Trump administration's focus on intensifying border surveillance, we can expect that a substantial portion of the advocacy we will need to do over the next three years will relate to the US border.

We should recall that, according to DHS, the "border" extends inward fully 100 miles from any national border or coastline, and that CBP happily conducts warrantless "border checks" on roads and trains and buses within that space. We will see increased securitization of airports, even those that do not have international flights. The government will attempt to make warrantless searches of your devices within this expanded "border" a routine reality. The implementation of "REAL ID" will make it almost impossible to travel long distances, or access federal services and benefits, without your ID being cross-checked against the FBI's "Next Generation Identification System", limiting our freedom to travel even within the country. Suspicionless immigration sweeps of minority neighborhoods will sweep up US persons as well, and will shatter the lives of US citizens as collateral damage. As is always the case with surveillance technologies and policies, what is pioneered with respect to non-US persons will be applied to US persons next. For much of this, the Trump administration won't need the consent of Congress, but Congress can countermand it if it so chooses.

So, we encourage you and your local Restore The Fourth chapter to explore collaborations with groups focused on immigrants' rights, as some of our best potential allies in surveillance fights to come.

What's New at RT4-National?

Our RT4 activists' check-in calls usually happen on the Fourth of every month, but the evening of February 4th is also Superbowl Sunday; so the next activists' check-in call will be 9pm EST, February 5, 2018; call in to (650) 285-1763 [no code]).

Our monthly board call will be Tuesday, January 30, at 4pm EST. If you're interested in board membership and would like to listen in, please contact Board Secretary Zaki Manian at zmanian@protonmail.com.

Our major work at RT4-National this month was on congressional efforts to prevent the renewal of Section 702 warrantless surveillance authorities. We generated whip lists for Senators surveillance reformers could call to try to persuade them to vote against cloture for the renewal of Section 702 surveillance authorities. We expected a maximum of 42-43 votes for our side, and a minimum of 27; we ended up with 38, which was not enough to keep debate open, but was better than we expected. In the House, pressure from us and our many partners led to a surprisingly strong showing for the USA RIGHTS Act, an excellent bill that gained the support of 42% of the members; unfortunately, however, Democratic leadership, in the form of Nancy Pelosi and Adam Schiff, encouraged over 50 Democrats to join a majority of Republicans in voting it down. Compared to 2012, the surveillance reform movement has clearly gained substantial support in Congress, especially among Republicans, which bodes well for the next renewal fight for these authorities in 2024.

The Supreme Court heard oral argument in two cases where we had submitted amicus briefs: Byrd and Collins. In Collins, our argument that a ruling for the government would open garages to warrantless searches caught the eye of the Chief Justice; in both, we are hopeful for favorable rulings. We submitted a new amicus brief this week in Microsoft Ireland, in partnership with EFF, the ACLU and the Brennan Center, arguing that the Fourth Amendment applies even when Microsoft does the seizing for the government, and applies at the point of seizure, not the point of analysis by a government agent. What with these, and our earlier work this Supreme Court session in Carpenter, we are now awaiting no fewer than four major Supreme Court decisions on the Fourth Amendment, that we hope will give this old piece of paper some new and much-needed life.

We're proud of what we're doing. If you think we're doing good work, please give generously!

What's New with RT4 Chapters?

RT4-Boston / Digital Fourth advocated for surveillance ordinances in Cambridge and Boston; and for better bodycam and ALPR policies at the State House.

RT4-Los Angeles pushed hard for 702 reform, and emphasized that surveillance is not neutral with respect to race.

RT4-Pittsburgh focused on the implications of algorithmic bias for the lives of poor and minority households.

RT4-RI / RI-Rights is doing a bunch of legislative work on bills relating to privacy, SWATting and expungement, among other issues.

RT4-SF Bay Area advocated on net neutrality and drew attention to attempts to water down Berkeley's proposed surveillance ordinance.

RT4-Susquehanna Valley called out PA legislators voting badly on surveillance, and drew attention to privacy improvements for local medical marijuana users.

The subreddit highlighted efforts in Congress to restrict civil asset forfeitures: https://www.reddit.com/r/restorethefourth/comments/7rytla/bipartisan_bills_in_congress_would_defund_federal/

News Roundup: In The States

CT: “We envision a future where every squad car in America has a drone integrated into its computer system” https://www.ctpost.com/local/article/Police-departments-find-uses-for-drones-12477400.php

DC: Charges dropped against 129 J20 defendants, but 59 remain: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/prosecutors-dropping-charges-against-129-alleged-inauguration-rioters-59-defendants-remain/article/2646384

News Roundup: National

(a) The day after the renewal of Section 702 mass surveillance authorities, Rep. Devin Nunes, chair of the House Intelligence Committee, claimed to have a "bombshell" memo exposing FISA abuses, and House Republicans appear to be beginning the process of declassifying it. It is more likely to relate to concerns over the "unmasking" process than directly to mass surveillance authorities. Whether Nunes's main aim is to take the heat off Trump for his campaign's links to Russia or not, there's a real issue here: That the law allows NSA, under the supervision of people in the White House, to conduct political surveillance of people involved in a presidential campaign, if those people are in contact with non-US persons of foreign intelligence interest; and those laws may be too permissive as they stand.

- https://saraacarter.com/2018/01/18/a-bombshell-house-intelligence-report-exposing-extensive-fisa-abuse-could-lead-to-the-removal-of-senior-government-officials/,

- https://theintercept.com/2018/01/19/republicans-have-four-easy-ways-to-releasethememo-and-the-evidence-for-it-not-doing-so-will-prove-them-to-be-shameless-frauds,

- http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/01/22/republicans-hope-to-release-jaw-dropping-memo-on-surveillance-abuses.html

(b) A last-minute provision slipped into the spending bill appears to allow the intelligence community, for the next three weeks, to shift around funding for covert programs without informing even the Intelligence Committees. Senator Burr, chair of Senate Intelligence, who usually cheerleads for the intelligence community, expressed serious reservations about giving them this much autonomy. https://theintercept.com/2018/01/22/the-top-republican-warns-under-new-spending-bill-the-intelligence-community-could-expend-funds-as-it-sees-fit/. Appropriately, immediately before the renewal of Section 702 powers, NSA removed any commitment to "honesty", "transparency" or "openness" from its mission statement: https://theintercept.com/2018/01/24/nsa-core-values-honesty-deleted/.

(c) Oopsie: NSA deleted data relating to Bush-era illegal mass warrantless surveillance, which it had been under a court order to preserve in connection with the Jewel litigation: https://www.politico.com/story/2018/01/19/nsa-deletes-surveillance-data-351730

(d) Some good writing from the last week on the implications of the reauthorization of surveillance powers; notably, Jake Laperruque is using the nomination of a new chair for the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board to call for the release of "the number", of Americans whose communications are swept up in Section 702 warrantless surveillance programs. Other commentators focus on the practical effect on the Justice Department, and review how anomalous Jeff Sessions' DOJ really is.

- http://thehill.com/opinion/cybersecurity/370271-after-foreign-surveillance-law-congress-must-demand-answers-from

- https://www.cato.org/blog/fear-mass-surveillance-our-toxic-political-cocktail

- http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/43298-what-congress-s-reauthorization-of-spying-law-means-for-americans-privacy

- https://www.emptywheel.net/2018/01/18/jack-goldsmith-and-susan-hennessey-run-cover-for-those-giving-jeff-sessions-unreviewable-authority-to-criminalize-dissent/

- https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/qvwx93/white-supremacist-justice-department-trumpweek

(e) An interesting case in the Sixth Circuit deals with whether law enforcement can assume that a homeowner has a computer: http://reason.com/volokh/2018/01/20/peffer-v-stephens-on-probable-cause-and

(f) An analysis of the speed with which warrants are granted throws doubt on how closely most judges review them: https://www.sltrib.com/news/2018/01/14/warrants-approved-in-just-minutes-are-utah-judges-really-reading-them-before-signing-off/

(g) An action by the NYC police union throws sunshine on the shady world of police "get out of jail free" cards: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-42780382, https://nypost.com/2018/01/21/police-union-slashes-number-of-get-out-of-jail-free-cards-issued/

(h) CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling is finally free: https://theintercept.com/2018/01/19/jeffrey-sterling-cia-leaking-prison/

News Roundup: International

(a) ICE enforcement is now targeting immigration activists and people with decades-old misdemeanors: https://www.thenation.com/article/ice-is-going-after-people-who-were-once-off-limits/, http://woodtv.com/2018/01/20/kzoo-doctor-detained-by-ice-after-40-years-in-us/

Canada: A former Special Agent in Charge of the DEA’s Special Operations Division, Derek Maltz, writes that Canadian law enforcement can obtain the telephone metadata of Canadian citizens from the DEA without a warrant, even though Canadian law normally imposes a requirement for judicial approval before the metadata of a Canadian suspect can be accessed. This includes metadata from the Hemisphere program, through which the DEA obtains telephone data from AT&T. http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/201801/23/01-5151076-programme-hemisphere-des-canadiens-surveilles-de-maniere-detournee.php (article in French only; apologies!)