Posted originally on the CTH on January 12, 2025 | Sundance

In this segment of Glenn Greenwald’s monologue, he outlines the background of the IC opposition to Tulsi Gabbard and how that pressure forced Gabbard to change her position on FISA-702 authorization. {Background}

Tulsi has been a prior critic of the warrantless surveillance of Americans through the FISA-702 process.  However, in order to get confirmed to President Trump’s cabinet as the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard has been forced to reverse her opposition to FISA-702.  This is how the DC Deep State operates.

Without getting a single Democrat vote, Gabbard would rely upon the Republican senators supporting her.  The republican senators will not support her unless she agrees to continue the surveillance state as it is currently utilized.  Gabbard is an example of what We The People are up against in this confrontation with DC politicians who support a weaponized surveillance state.  WATCH:

To be fair, an argument can be made that Mrs. Gabbard is saying that she is going to keep FISA but have a stricter threshold for its use, and that would still be a change for the better in protecting citizens from its widespread use to surveil us at whim. Keeping FISA doesn’t necessarily mean she can’t affect a lack of it’s use domestically.  However, that is somewhat hopeium and wish-casting.

Given the extreme nature of how the 702 processes have been used, and combined with the new AI tools being constructed to exploit the metadata capture of all American citizens to expedite the surveillance results, it is critical to find actionable control mechanisms before the next reauthorization comes up again.

One approach might be to trigger immediate consequences for the unlawful use of the NSA database.  The revocation of security clearances in combination with criminal accountability for misuse could easily be written into law.  However, once again that relies on the willingness of the supporting lawmakers to agree to some accountability measure.  As of right now, there is no such consequence.

Office of Inspector General Michael Horowitz testified April 27, 2023, that more than 3.4 million search queries into the NSA database took place between Dec. 1st, 2020, and Nov. 30th, 2021, by government officials and/or contractors working on behalf of the federal government. These search queries were based on authorizations related to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

[OIG Testimony HERE]

Approximately 30% of those 3.4 million search queries were outside the rules and regulations that govern warrantless searches, what the politically correct government calls “non-compliant searches.”  That means more than 1 million searches of private documents and communication of Americans were illegal and outside the rules.

Additionally, IG Horowitz also admitted that somewhere north of 10,000 federal employees have access to conduct these searches of the NSA database; a database which contains the electronic data of every single American, including emails, text messages, social media posts, instant messages, direct messages, phone calls, geolocation identifiers, purchases by electronic funds, banking records and any keystroke any American person puts into any electronic device for any reason.

If we were in a functioning system of government everything would be stopped right now, and no conversation would be taking place that was not about this issue. This is the total and complete surveillance state being talked about as if we were discussing what’s for dinner.

If you ask me why in hindsight, I now take the position that FISA-702 is the gateway to the massive surveillance system currently being put into place using Real ID and the AI facial recognition software provided by Palantir (CIA exploit).  In essence, the gateway that allows the full-scale surveillance state, is opened by the prior authorization of FISA-702 that negates any 4th amendment protection.

This is beyond jaw-dropping.

Context: In 2018 CTH revealed through research of their own documents that FBI and DOJ/FBI contractors had done more than 1,000 illegal searches using the NSA database, targeting Republican primary candidates from November 2015 through May 2016. These stunning admissions were from the DOJ’s own reporting to the FISA court.

Few were paying attention.

Although the number of the illegal search queries were redacted, we know the number is four digits from the size of the redacted text. More than 1,000 and less than 9,999.

FAST FORWARD TO 2023 – April 27, 2023, IG Horowitz outlined that more than 1.1 million illegal searches of this database were conducted in 2021 during the first year of the Joe Biden administration.

Additionally, and perhaps more consequentially, to give scope to how the process of total domestic surveillance has expanded, Horowitz now admits in 2021 the number of federal government employees with access to this total metadata collection system now exceeds 10,000 people. STOP THE PRESSES!

Yes, congress is talking about this ‘as if’ there is some level of importance.  However, the basic questions are not being asked or have perhaps just become so accepted that legislators have become oblivious to the insanity of it.   Beyond the blood boiling questions about searching the NSA database, questions like:

In order for these search queries to take place, there has to be a housing facility to capture it.

Where is all of this electronic data being stored?

Why is all of this electronic data being stored?

Who is in control of this all-encompassing electronic data collection?

Forget the searches for a moment, what act of congress authorized the capture of this private data collection?  Essentially electronic intercepts of communication systems that flow throughout our life.

The background context here is congress debating the renewal of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and the power of the DOJ and FBI to intercept American citizen communication and electronic data via the “702” authorizations, that permit the NSA database to be searched and queried.

If the inspector general is now admitting the FISA laws have been so comprehensively corrupted such that 3.4 million searches by more than 10,000 federal employees and government contractors now have access, there is no way that any reasonably intelligent person should support such reauthorization.  Even contemplating this request is absurd, beyond absurd.

The United States government is admitting to the public that a total and comprehensive surveillance state is currently in place, and 10,000 federal government agents have the authorization to monitor everything we do.  This is the admitted and current status of RIGHT NOW. 

In eight days, President Donald J Trump is scheduled to be sworn in as President of the United States. In my non-pretending world, this is likely to be the last time in our lifetime to drag the conversation of how we define liberty into the American psyche. All of my research in the past two decades indicates this likelihood is not hyperbole. We have one shot at this, and our time is now.

Liberty, the fundamental decision to retain it or lose it, is the context for all other contexts that have preceded it. The principles of liberty that we have defined for generations cannot exist in an American surveillance state. Thus, the secretive courts, the unlawful usurpation of the 4th Amendment, the short-sighted ramifications of the Patriot Act, the weaponization of our federal law enforcement and police agencies, all of it, must be reviewed through this fundamental core issue, Liberty.