March 23, 2011 - 11:18am
Yesterday, a federal appeals court reinstated the ACLU lawsuit challenging the FISA Amendments Act (FAA), a statute that gives the executive branch virtually unchecked power to collect Americans' international e-mails and telephone calls.
ACLU Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer:
The government's surveillance practices should not be immune from judicial review, and this decision ensures that they won't be. The law we've challenged permits the government to conduct dragnet surveillance of Americans' international communications, and it has none of the safeguards that the Constitution requires. Now that the appeals court has recognized that our clients have the right to challenge the law, we look forward to pressing that challenge in the trial court.
For more on the decision, Glenn Greenwald has an excellent analysis that can be read here.
