New Appointee to Lead Intelligence Department Is a Threat to Our Security

(WASHINGTON) — Watchdogs are sounding alarm bells around President Donald Trump’s appointment of Bill Pulte to be the new acting director of national intelligence. Don Bell, policy counsel at the Project On Government Oversight, issued the following statement:

“Bill Pulte — someone with an appalling lack of national security experience and a reputation for weaponizing the justice system to attack the president’s political opponents — is the last person who should be given the keys to access Americans’ most intimate and personal information.

“Already, we are witnessing a dangerously escalating pattern of surveillance abuse across this administration, from Kash Patel admitting the FBI is buying our location data to the destruction of longstanding privacy protections at administrative agencies across the federal government, to DHS developing a vast surveillance apparatus for warrantless mass surveillance. Appointing Pulte is the most urgent illustration yet of why Congress must pass legislation now to protect people from warrantless government surveillance.

“For the past several weeks, Congress has been engaged in a fight to close loopholes that allow the government to gather Americans’ private information without a warrant. Now, with this dangerous appointment to lead the country’s profoundly powerful intelligence apparatus, the stakes are even higher. By adding commonsense reforms to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — namely, closing the backdoor search loophole and data broker loophole — lawmakers can protect our information from government abuse and show the administration that the Fourth Amendment is not optional.”