Obama To Extend Patriot Act Provisions Nobody Uses

The Obama administration announced its willingness to extend three provisions of the Patriot Act that the Justice Department says it doesn’t really use.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Obama administration announced its willingness to extend three provisions of the Patriot Act that the Justice Department says it doesn’t really use.

The provisions include access to business records, monitoring of “lone wolf terrorists,” and running roving wiretaps.

The Justice Department has said that the business records provision has been used 220 times in three years; the lone wolf provision has never been used; and the roving wiretaps provision on average of 22 times a year.
But the Obama administration said that it may use these provisions sometime in the future when there is a need, though supports adding more privacy protections.

Civil rights groups say that these laws enacted after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, give the federal government the right to invade citizens’ private records and telecommunications conversations.

President Barack Obama campaigned as a presidential candidate on reviewing, not striking down, the Patriot Act once in office.

According to the American Civil Liberties Union, Obama’s stance is better than the previous president’s, but could hopefully advocate more safeguards to international communications, protests, and religious assemblies.