Bills to extend a key surveillance law and end a government shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security both made their way through Congress this week, dividing the New Jersey congressional delegation along some unexpected lines.
Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which allows for warrantless surveillance of foreign nationals even when they come into contact with American citizens, was set to expire today, setting off a mad dash to renew it. Within the last week, efforts to extend FISA for 18 months, five years, and three years all came up and were scuttled for one reason or another; a 45-day temporary extension finally succeeded this afternoon.
Republicans were more amenable to the surveillance law than Democrats, but three New Jersey Democrats – Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-Tenafly), Herb Conaway (D-Delran), and Donald Norcorss (D-Camden), all members of either the Intelligence or Armed Services Committees – were among the 42 members of their party to support the three-year extension yesterday. A fourth, Rep. Nellie Pou (D-North Haledon), opposed the longer-term extension but supported the 45-day stopgap.
Gottheimer said that while he wants to make sure Americans’ civil liberties are safeguarded, a key talking point for FISA’s critics, he also views the law as critical to making sure “the bad guys who seek to kill Americans” are kept at bay.
“I know that the information that we receive, that the intelligence community receives, from these sources is critical to protecting our country. There’s no ambiguity,” he said. “Of course, there’s also protections in place to make sure that it’s only used to listen to the bad guys, to protect Americans, and no one should play politics, ever, with our national security.”
Many other Democrats, though, don’t agree with that assessment of the law. Rep. Rob Menendez (D-Jersey City) has voted in favor of FISA reauthorizations in the past, but he said that the Trump administration’s actions have made him wary to support them again.
“With this administration, and the risk they pose in every single way – and how they’ve used other agencies and branches and authorities to harm Americans – I’m not signing up for it,” Menendez said. “They have the obligation, if they need it for national security, to meet us where we are.”
Also somewhat FISA-skeptical is Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-Dennis), who was one of a dozen Republicans to oppose the five-year extension proposal last week. Van Drew voted in favor of both bills this week, though, saying that it was better to let a flawed program continue for now and push for more reforms in the future.
“Here we are in Iran. We know we have sleeper cells, not just Iranian but in general, we have lots of security issues in the country,” he said. “Do we just literally let it lapse, and we don’t have the ability at all to do queries or searches, or do we do this for now and then try to do better in the future? And I chose the latter.”
Another critical House vote this week didn’t involve a roll-call tally at all. More than two months into a partial government shutdown precipitated by a dispute over ICE funding, the House passed a DHS funding bill on a voice vote today that the Senate had approved weeks ago, at last reopening the wide-ranging department.
At Democrats’ insistence, the bill does not include any funding for ICE, which separately got a huge influx of funds thanks to last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill. Republicans are also working on new party-line legislation to provide another $70 billion to keep ICE funded for years to come; the first step to do so, a budget resolution, passed the Senate last week and the House this week.
Van Drew, who like all of his fellow Republicans voted in favor of the budget resolution, said that he hopes the reconciliation process, as it’s called, remains as uncomplicated and straightforward as it can be.
“I think we should keep it as narrow as possible. The more we expand it, the more people we aggravate,” he said. “We know that, as part of the Homeland Security appropriations bill, we can’t get ICE in it. We don’t have the votes. So we have to do that separately, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Menendez, though, said the bill’s focus on ICE funding was proof that Republicans have lost touch with what Americans are asking for.
“You would think, ‘Let’s use reconciliation to create some relief for people.’ Instead, they’re using it to do more money for DHS, for ICE, for CBP,” he said. “Republicans are just either ignorant – they don’t talk to their constituents – or they’re purposefully trying to make it harder.”
