Republicans push for phone company immunity
Posted by Anne Broache | 4 comments Republican politicians in the U.S. House of Representatives failed last month to persuade Democratic leaders to back a spy law rewrite that would immunize telecommunications companies that cooperated with allegedly illegal government spying. Now they're trying to force the issue.
On Wednesday, a number of Republican leaders, including Lamar Smith (R-Texas), Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.) and Peter King (R-N.Y.), began circulating what's known as a "discharge" petition, which they characterized as a "rare step." If they obtain 218 signatures from their colleagues, they say the Democratic leadership will be forced to schedule a vote on a version of the bill passed by the U.S. Senate in February that would likely wipe out pending lawsuits against AT&T and other phone companies accused of illegal cooperation with the National Security Agency.
"More than 66 days have passed since House Democrats allowed a key piece of terrorist surveillance legislation to expire--not because they had concerns with the bill, but because they were seemingly more concerned that not enough trial lawyers would be able to file enough expensive and frivolous lawsuits against U.S. telecom firms," Republican whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said in a statement.
Blunt was referring to the House's decision to let a temporary expansion of the spy law known as the Protect America Act, which Congress passed hurriedly last summer, lapse. The House did, however, go on to narrowly approve a rewrite of electronic surveillance law last month that lacked controversial legal protections for telecommunications companies that cooperated with allegedly illegal government spying.
more:
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9927141-7.html?tag=newsmap
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