Wikipedia case against NSA internet snooping returns to court

Attorneys for Wikipedia are scheduled to return to federal court next week in a long-running fight to limit government surveillance of internet messages. The case has seen some successes, including an appeals court win on standing in 2017, and civil libertarians see the case as a way to stop the National Security Agency from siphoning data from the internet’s backbone to store for warrantless searches. The Trump administration argues the case cannot be decided without harming government secrets, however. A similar case, filed in 2008 by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, was dismissed last month by a judge in California who found a “fair and full adjudication” would require “potentially harmful disclosures of national security information.”

Filed in 2015, the Wikimedia Foundation case predates the term “FISA abuse” as applied to a warrant against Trump campaign associate Carter Page and instead focuses on a program operated under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that could impact anyone. The Wikimedia Foundation, represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, relies on math to argue the NSA is intercepting its messages as part of Upstream collection, a program that takes records from major internet cables and switches. Although set up to target terrorists and spies, records "incidentally" collected on U.S. citizens can be searched without a warrant. “Wikimedia, with trillions of communications, is a different kind of plaintiff,” a filing this month argued. “The immense volume and global distribution of Wikimedia’s communications ensures that its communications travel on every possible Internet path into and out of the country.”

The most recent filing urges U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis to privately review classified evidence after May 30 oral arguments, before ruling on a Trump administration motion to dismiss. The online giant said additional secrets don't need to be disclosed for it to prevail in the case. Ellis, who works from a courtroom in Alexandria, Va., became nationally known this year presiding over former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s trial. He questioned the rationale for prosecuting Manafort and demanded to see a secret document setting the scope of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. Ultimately, Ellis sharply deviated from sentencing guidelines, giving Manafort fewer than 4 years in prison, rather than 19-24 years.

ACLU attorney Patrick Toomey, who is representing Wikimedia, gave an upbeat assessment, saying he believes the law requires Ellis to review evidence before ruling. “Congress has authorized courts to use special safeguards in surveillance cases like this one, rather than dismissing those cases outright. A ruling for Wikimedia would allow this challenge to move forward based on the extensive public record, and it would ensure that our courts have the chance to determine whether the NSA’s spying is lawful,” Toomey said. Attorney Kurt Opsahl of the Electronic Frontier Foundation said in a recent interview that the stakes are high. "Millions of ordinary Americans are being swept up in this dragnet. The notion is we sweep up everything, and then, we look for what we need. It’s turning the Fourth Amendment on its head," Opsahl said.

The section of law that the NSA says allows for the internet collection, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, was renewed last year by President Trump without significant changes, following failed attempts in Congress to prevent alleged “backdoor searches” of records on U.S. citizens. The Wikimedia case is one of the final legal challenges filed specifically in response to former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s 2013 disclosures. Most other cases have been ruled moot after Congress ended a dragnet phone-record program.

Ellis initially ruled against Wikimedia before being reversed on standing, or the legal right to sue, by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit. The judge is likely to turn heads during oral arguments, as he did in the Manafort case. During a 2015 hearing, he questioned the adequacy of the secret court handling FISA warrants and gave colorful commands to attorneys on both sides. “When I start [talking] you need to stop,” Ellis told a prominent Justice Department attorney in 2015, adding to Toomey: “This isn’t politics, you’re not on the stump!”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/courts/wikipedia-case-against-nsa-internet-snooping-returns-to-court

Bill Weld concedes GOP voters do not yet want his challenge to Trump

Bill Weld conceded in an interview this week that Republican voters have little appetite for his insurgent primary bid to block President Trump from renomination in 2020. The former Massachusetts governor did not dispute Trump’s high approval ratings with self-identified Republicans, nor claim a silent groundswell for his long shot campaign. But Weld predicted Trump would grow vulnerable to a primary challenge in the months ahead, insisting his campaign was a key element in softening the political support the president enjoys inside the GOP.

“A primary challenger can, as Pat Buchanan did, help to create that unrest,” Weld told C-SPAN’s “Newsmakers” from New Hampshire, where he has campaigned almost exclusively since launching his bid in April. Weld was referring to Buchanan's challenge of incumbent George H.W. Bush in the Republican presidential primary in 1992. Some blame the Buchanan challenge for sinking Bush in the general election, which he lost to Bill Clinton. “A year is a long time — 18 months is forever in national politics, and a lot is going on,” Weld said, adding that Trump committed a strategic error when he told House Democrats he would not negotiate on legislation until they stop investigating him. “The president is just abdicating his responsibility as president. I think that is so outrageous that I think it’s going to sink in over time in the consciousness of the American people that we can’t have this guy doing this job,” Weld charged.

Trump routinely garners the support of more than 90% of Republican voters in public opinion polls, although his job approval overall remains mired in the low 40s. Some Republicans opposed to Trump had hoped that the report from special counsel Robert Mueller, detailing the federal investigation into the 2016 campaign, might be a tipping point for the president. But Mueller concluded that Trump did not conspire with Russia to defeat Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

Weld is not the first choice to challenge the president among some of the leading Never Trump Republicans. They would prefer Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, who is considering a bid; former Ohio Gov. John Kasich; or some other higher profile Republican. But Trump’s strength, and the preference for other primary challengers among Republicans who oppose Trump, do not appear to be discouraging Weld. The 73 year-old politician sketched out his strategy for winning enough delegates in primaries to earn the right to have his name placed in nomination at the national convention in Charlotte in 2020. And he revealed he would begin campaigning outside of New Hampshire, host of the first primary. Weld plans to focus on states in New England and the mid-Atlantic, regions he described as a “beachhead” from which to build his underdog campaign because they can be friendly to Republicans like him: conservative on fiscal policy but liberal on social issues. Weld also intends to campaign in states that allow independents to vote in party primaries. “We’re hiring, we’re staffing up. Within the next couple of weeks I’m going to be in Maryland, in Texas, in California — so we’re starting to travel more broadly,” he said, describing his unfolding effort as “the makings for a very serious challenge.”

In a recent poll of Maryland Republicans, Trump crushed Hogan in a hypothetical primary matchup by a margin of 68%-24%.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/campaigns/bill-weld-concedes-gop-voters-do-not-yet-want-his-challenge-to-trump

NASA executive quits weeks after appointment to lead 2024 moon landing plan

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - A top NASA executive hired in April to guide strategy for returning astronauts to the moon by 2024 has resigned, the space agency said on Thursday, the culmination of internal strife and dwindling congressional support for the lunar initiative. Mark Sirangelo, named six weeks ago as special assistant to NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, left the agency as NASA abandoned a reorganization plan due to a chilly reception on Capitol Hill, Bridenstine said in a statement. Two individuals close to the space program and familiar with the situation said Sirangelo was escorted out of NASA’s headquarters in Washington on Wednesday after his resignation.

His departure came after lawmakers rejected NASA’s proposal to create a separate directorate within the space agency to oversee future lunar missions and ultimately develop human exploration of Mars. “The proposal was not accepted at this time, so we will move forward under our current organizational structure,” Bridenstine said. “Given NASA is no longer pursuing the new mission directorate, Mark has opted to pursue other opportunities.”

Last week, the Trump administration asked Congress to increase NASA’s spending next year by $1.6 billion as a “down payment” on the accelerated goal of landing Americans back on the moon by 2024, more than half a century after the end of the U.S. Apollo lunar program. The latest initiative was dubbed Artemis, after the goddess of the hunt and the moon in Greek mythology and the twin sister of Apollo. NASA had aimed to return crewed spacecraft to the lunar surface by 2028, after putting a “Gateway” station into lunar orbit by 2024. However, the prospect of additional funding drew little enthusiasm from congressional appropriators.

The two people with knowledge of the matter said Sirangelo’s ouster was sealed by increasing skepticism that 2024 was a realistic deadline for moon landings. In his statement, Bridenstine said the agency was still exploring what organizational changes were “necessary to maximize efficiencies and achieve the end state of landing the first woman and the next man on the moon by 2024.” “If the $1.6 billion does not materialize, we will fall back on the previous plan, which was to land in 2028,” the NASA chief told reporters at a news conference earlier in the day. NASA announced earlier on Thursday it had selected the space technology company Maxar Technologies Inc as the first contractor to help build the “Gateway” outpost.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-space-exploration-nasa/nasa-executive-quits-weeks-after-being-named-to-lead-moon-initiative-idUSKCN1SU0A5