White House Dismissed '02 Surveillance Proposal

WaPo reported

The Bush administration rejected a 2002 Senate proposal that would have made it easier for FBI agents to obtain surveillance warrants in terrorism cases, concluding that the system was working well and that it would likely be unconstitutional to lower the legal standard.

That is reasonable. The NSA should get enough evidence by listening in to calls from Al Qaeda outside the US to their cell members here in the US that the FBI can then get a warrent under the current FISA law.

The proposed legislation by Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) would have allowed the FBI to obtain surveillance warrants for non-U.S. citizens if they had a "reasonable suspicion" they were connected to terrorism -- a lower standard than the "probable cause" requirement in the statute that governs the warrants.

We certainly want the NSA to have the ability to listen in on International phone calls, where a known or suspected Al Qaeda is on one end of the call, but before the FBI starts listening in on domestic calls we want them to get a FISA warrent.