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More FISA Orders Were Denied During President Trump's First Year in Office Than in the Court's 40-Year History (zdnet.com)
In its first year, the Trump administration kept one little-known courtroom in the capital busy. From a report: A secretive Washington DC-based court that oversees the US government's foreign spy programs denied more surveillance orders during President Donald Trump's first year than in the court's 40-year history, according to newly released figures. Annual data published Wednesday by the US Courts shows that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance (FISA) Court last year denied 26 applications in full, and 50 applications in part. That's compared to 21 orders between when the court was first formed in 1978 and President Barack Obama's final year in office in 2016.
In its first year, the Trump administration kept one little-known courtroom in the capital busy.
There's nothing in the story about whether the gov't made more or fewer FISA requests in 2016.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
It says 'they' are embarrassed by the unreasonable approval rates that were revealed after the election. The judges are _now_ doing their jobs, not rubber stamping.
Which is good, I guess. Another example of routine corruption that got exposed and derailed by Trump's election.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Or were they denied because the standards have changed due to some recently publicized abuses, meaning how many would have been denied if submitted about two years ago?
All we have are some numbers, and now people will claim conclusions that fit their desired viewpoint.
OK, let's do a little research and look at the actual data. We can get all the reports since transparency was mandated in 2015:
USCourts Report on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Courts' Activities
According to FISA's data, in 2016:
"The FISC disclosed that it received 1,752 applications in 2016. After consideration by the court, 1,378
orders were granted, 339 orders were modified, 26 orders were denied in part, and 9 applications were
denied in full."
Meanwhile, in the latest report, from 2017, during the first year of the Trump administration:
"The FISC disclosed that it received 1,614 applications in 2017. After consideration by the court, 1,147
orders were granted, 391 orders were modified, 50 orders were denied in part, and 26 applications
were denied in full."
So what does this tell us? Applications for survellience were actually a bit lower, but denials went from .5% of Obama's FBI to 1.5% of Trump's FBI's requests. Does that mean the requests were of lower quality in 2017? The FISA court was feeling a little chastened by all of the publicity of its usual rubber-stamp policy? Or the FISA court is a bunch of liberal cheeto-haters? Hard to say?
Silly Rabbit, The NSA and FISA are tools of the beltway insiders, no way they will let an outsider get his grubby orange hands on them.
Given the FISA court will give a warrant on a french bagel you have to wonder what exactly Trumps new "torture first" group of CIA/NSA spies are asking for warrants on.
If they say Obama refused 21, and Trump has said fsck off to 26
You've got the situation reversed. When you're a law enforcement officer dealing with national security and want to request a warrant, you can't go to a normal court to ask for a warrant since it's a sensitive matter, so you instead go to a FISA court to ask for a warrant. The Presidential administration isn't refusing anything: they're the ones making the requests, and it's the FISA court refusing the requests of the intelligence/law enforcement agencies serving under the President.
Anyway, depending on how you interpret the information, this difference could mean a few different things:
1) If you assume that the FISA court has up to now been failing at its duty to provide oversight (which is a frequent complaint among many people here), then one interpretation is that the FISA court has finally started performing its duty instead of rubber-stamping everything that crosses their desks.
2) If you assume that the rejection rate for requests being made under Trump is the same as prior rejection rates, that would mean that agencies under Trump are making SIGNIFICANTLY more requests than agencies serving under previous administrations.
3) If you assume that the FISA court is behaving impartially and otherwise the same as before, then this difference is evidence that Trump's administration is abusing the system by asking for unwarranted warrants on a regular basis.
4) If you assume that the FISA court is acting partially, this difference could be evidence that the judges serving on the FISA court are rejecting requests on account of who's the boss of the people making the requests.
Or it could be some combination of the above or other factors that I've failed to account for here. The fact is, a single data point doesn't really tell us much about what's going on. I'm hoping the FISA court is finally waking up to their duties, but I figure that it's likely a combination of #1, #3, and #4.
2010: 1511, 0 rejected
2011: 1676, 0 rejected
2012: 1789, 0 rejected
2013: 1588, 0 rejected
2014: 1379, 0 rejected
2015: 1457, 5 rejected
2016: 1485, 34 rejected
2017: 1614, 26 rejected
https://epic.org/privacy/surve...
is Trump's administration denying more requests a good thing because they're denying bad requests or a bad thing because they're making so many outlandish requests. No real telling since it's a secret court.
Well, only one of the 11 FISA judges has been appointed since Trump took office, and Trump and his administration had no control over the choice -- appointments are made by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, with no executive or Congressional oversight, review or even input. Chief Justice Roberts has appointed all 11 of the current FISA judges. So, it's safe to say that the composition of the court hasn't changed with the administration.
What has changed is the leadership of the DoJ. So it seems clear that what has changed is the nature of the requests -- or possibly the number, but it would require a massive increase in number of requests to cause this change. My money is on the nature of the requests.
OTOH, the court rejected nine in 2016, the largest number in any year (until 2017). From 1979 to 2015, there were 12 rejections, in 2016 there were nine, in 2017 there were 26. So the change seems to predate Trump, a little.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
The problem is, it's statistics that don't mean jack squat.
It COULD mean the administration is doing their job. Or it COULD mean the administration is producing very poor requests that judges are denying because they're stupid.
And the latter is certainly possible if a certain commander in chief wanted to spy on all his "enemies" and got rejected more times.
The problem is, we don't know. We can never know because the nature of the courts won't let use determine if the rejections are because the courts are applying more scrutiny, or because the requests are of poorer quality and thus rejected because there is no basis for approving them?
So, as a way-out-there social liberal who really dislikes Trump and has said bad things about him (and thought worse things), I feel like I owe it to somebody to say 'well done.'
The cognitive dissonance in my head right now is making it hard for me to follow the threads in the comments. I really did not see this one coming.
Just, wow.
I'm on the conservative/libertarian end across from you. I did not vote for Trump. I think he's an egotistical asshole with no fixed ideological principles of his own to speak of, has no filters between his emotions and his mouth, and doesn't know when it's best to keep said mouth shut.
I'm almost as stunned as you.
I admire your honesty, we need more of that.
If I may, allow me to suggest reading a fantastic book by Jonah Goldberg called "The Suicide Of The West". Absolutely brilliant, no matter where you stand ideologically or politically.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
I'm almost as stunned as you.
What is more likely, a sudden break out of ethics in Trump world or something else?
I'm guessing it is something else. Here are some possibilities.
1.) Good people are doing their jobs. It has nothing to do with Trump. Some other event is responsible.
2.) Trump appointed one or more of those good people. (It is certainly possible. His major criteria is how much they praise him, which doesn't eliminate the possibility of competence.)
3.) They are being rejected because the requests are now so bat shit crazy that not even FISA will tolerate it.
Personally, if I was going to bet money, I'd bet on 3. We'd need to see a random sampling of requests then and now to really conclude much...