BILL NUMBER: SR 16	INTRODUCED
	BILL TEXT


INTRODUCED BY   Senator Lieu

                        AUGUST 12, 2013

   Relative to Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act.


	LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
             HOUSE OR SENATE RESOLUTIONS DO NOT CONTAIN A DIGEST



   WHEREAS, Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act (50 U.S.C. Sec. 1861)
authorizes the government to collect "tangible things" that are
"relevant" to an authorized national security investigation; and
   WHEREAS, The National Security Agency (NSA) has reportedly used
Section 215 to collect metadata on every telephone call made or
received by every American over the last seven years; and
   WHEREAS, This metadata collected by the NSA was not limited to
dialed numbers, but also included the telephone numbers of incoming
calls, the times of calls, and call routing information; and
   WHEREAS, Many legislators who voted for the USA PATRIOT Act,
including the past chairman of the authorizing committee of that law,
have stated that the NSA's blanket surveillance program goes far
beyond what the USA PATRIOT Act was intended to do; and
   WHEREAS, The Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper,
Jr., has admitted to misleading Congress about the actual scope of
the call record surveillance program; and
   WHEREAS, Section 215 is silent as to how the government may use
these records once it has obtained them; and
   WHEREAS, The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution
states: "The right of the people to be secure in their persons,
houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and
seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but
upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and
particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or
things to be seized"; and
   WHEREAS, The United States Constitution, including the Fourth
Amendment, applies at all times to all government agencies and all
government employees; and
   WHEREAS, All Americans cannot reasonably be considered to be
suspicious simply for making or receiving telephone calls; and
   WHEREAS, The NSA's seizure of the telephone records of all
Americans is therefore an "unreasonable seizure" by any definition of
the term; and
   WHEREAS, The bipartisan Amash-Conyers amendment to the Department
of Defense Appropriations Act (H.R. 2397) would have ended the NSA's
blanket seizure of the telephone records of Americans, but was
narrowly defeated on July 24, 2013; and
   WHEREAS, On August 1, 2013, United States Senator Al Franken
introduced legislation, the Surveillance Transparency Act of 2013 (S.
1452), that would expand and improve ongoing government reporting
about programs under the USA PATRIOT Act and the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act and make it easier for companies to voluntarily
disclose information about the data the government requires them to
collect; now, therefore, be it
   Resolved by the Senate of the State of California,That the Senate
urges the President and the Congress of the United States to pass
legislation to end the NSA's blanket, unreasonable, and
unconstitutional collection of Americans' telephone records and
specifically to bar the NSA and other agencies from using Section 215
of the USA PATRIOT Act to collect records, including telephone
records, pertaining to persons not subject to an investigation under
the USA PATRIOT Act; and be it further
   Resolved, That the Secretary of the Senate transmit copies of this
resolution to the President and Vice President of the United States,
to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, to the Majority
Leader of the Senate, and to each Senator and Representative from
California in the Congress of the United States, and to the author
for appropriate distribution.