Reply #43: Then what was this press release doing at his website? [View All]

[The Count]

SENATE PASSES STRONG ANTITERRORISM LAW

http://edwards.senate.gov/press/2001/oct26-pr.html
October 26, 2001


WASHINGTON–The Senate on Thursday passed a sweeping antiterrorism bill
that expanded the wiretapping and electronic surveillance authority of
the FBI and imposed stronger penalties for harboring or bankrolling
terrorists.

"This will strengthen our nation's ability to prevent future terrorist
attacks," said Senator John Edwards, who worked on the legislation as a
member of the Judiciary Committee and the Select Committee on
Intelligence.

The Uniting and Strengthening America Act, signed into law on Friday by
President Bush, makes the criminal law tougher on terrorists by making
it a crime to possess a biological agent or toxin in an amount with no
reasonable, peaceful purpose. It also outlaws harboring a terrorist,
and makes it a crime to provide financial support for terrorism.

The legislation brings wiretap laws into the wireless world of 21st
century communications technology. Under old law, the FBI could use a
basic search warrant to access answering machine messages, but agents
needed a different kind of warrant to get voice mail. The new law says
the FBI can use a traditional warrant for both.

Under the law in force before September 11, when highjacked planes
crashed into the Pentagon and World Trade Center, federal courts could
authorize many electronic surveillance warrants only in the place where
the court had jurisdiction. If the target of an investigation lived in
Charlotte, for example, but the subject of the warrant was technically
an Internet Service Provider located in Raleigh, the warrant wouldn't
let agents track the electronic trail of email records or web surfing
activities. The new law lets the court overseeing an investigation
issue valid warrants nationwide.

Another common-sense change gives law enforcement officers and the
intelligence community the ability to share intelligence information
with each other. "We simply cannot prevail in the battle against
terrorism if the right hand of our government has no idea what the left
hand is doing," Senator Edwards said.

The measure also strengthens the powers of law enforcement authorities
that are governed by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. "When I
met with FBI agents in Charlotte shortly after September 11, they told
me their number-one priority was to streamline the process for
conducting investigations of foreign agents operating in the United
States. We've done that," Senator Edwards said. "We have made sure the
FBI can focus on investigations, not filling out unnecessary paperwork."