14 DAY TRIAL // Federal judges questioned a Justice Department lawyer about the National Security Agency’s habit of collecting US phone data in bulk, as the probe regarding the constitutionality of the program has begun.
The Guardian reports that the three-judge panel from the second circuit court of appeals questioned Stuart Delery, assistant attorney general, about the scope and breadth of the collection program.
The meeting was quite interesting since Delery had to defend the program that is no longer supported by the Obama administration. In fact, the US president proposed earlier this year that the NSA’s data collection program should be weakened greatly.
The judges were interested in figuring out what was so interesting about the metadata the NSA collects in order for the agency to scoop up all domestic phone records without having the suspicion that the individuals were actually involved in any kind of terrorism plot, espionage or any other criminal activity.
The court finds itself in an odd situation because it will have to consider the program’s constitutionality before it comes to a conclusion about whether or not it is legal, as it usually happens. That’s because, as the Justice Department official pointed out, the judges don’t have the necessary authority to consider the legality of the bulk call metadata collection.
Alas, the group of judges was quite adamant to get the truth out of Delery, even though they quickly became frustrated with his tactic. Judge Robert D Sack told the assistant attorney general that he was mostly replying on declassified materials and asked what he wasn’t telling them. They also seemed annoyed that they were only getting information that the public already knows thanks to Edward Snowden.
The case ended up at the appeals court after a judge refused to grant the American Civil Liberties Union an injunction to stop the collection program. At the time, there was a series of conflicting statements coming from various judges across the US, since some were supporting the NSA and others were saying that the bulk collection program was straight out of Orwell’s work.
It is quite likely that the case won’t be solved in this court, however, but will head for the Supreme Court sometime in the future, just as it had been assumed since last year. Many don’t believe the NSA program is constitutional, even though it might have legal coverage.