Quotes & Sayings About Patriot Act

The Patriot Act unleashed the FBI to search your email, travel and credit records without even a suspicion of wrongdoing. — Barton Gellman

The PATRIOT Act allows Federal agents to look at public and university library patron circulation records, books checked out, magazines consulted, all subject to government scrutiny. There used to be a time in this country when we were worried whether our young people knew how to read. Now some in our government are more worried that government agents be able to find out what people are reading. — Dennis Kucinich

Decisive action has been taken on the home front with passage of the USA Patriot Act, which has strengthened the hand of law enforcement agencies to stop terrorists before they can act. — Roger Wicker

If middle-class Americans do not feel threatened by the slow encroachment of the police state or the Patriot Act, it is because they live comfortably enough and exercise their liberties very lightly, never testing the boundaries. You never know you are in a prison unless you try the door. — Joe Bageant

Thanks in part to the Patriot Act, the federal government has been able to demand some details of your online activities from service providers - and not to tell you about it. — Jonathan Zittrain

We have been through four and five generations of technology since the PATRIOT Act. — Carly Fiorina

I don't want to weaken the Patriot Act. I want to repeal it. — Jon Tester

While lawyers are arguing about the PATRIOT Act or the America Freedom Act, the point is, the terrorists have moved on, the technologists have moved on, and we, the United States of America, are not taking advantage of the latest and greatest in technology the terrorists are. We need to get smart about it. — Carly Fiorina

As a human being with notoriety and a big mouth, I've felt most threatened during the first Bush Administration. Whenever there's a Bush in the White House, many people die, and the rest of us are threatened. I just didn't think it would happen quite so quickly. The so-called USA Patriot Act, and the announcement of trying people in military tribunals if Bush or Rumsfeld's or Ashcroft's people think they somehow qualify as terrorists, basically, this is McCarthyism run amok. — Jello Biafra

The original PATRIOT Act greatly increased our nation's ability to share intelligence information, made better use of technology, and provided terrorism investigators tools that have long been available in cases involving illegal drugs and organized crime. — Michael K. Simpson

Since 9/11, the U.S.A. Patriot Act has torn down the invisible wall that was perceived as preventing the FBI and CIA from sharing information. — Ronald Kessler

If the events of September 11, 2001, have proven anything, it's that the terrorists can attack us, but they can't take away what makes us American
our freedom, our liberty, our civil rights. No, only Attorney General John Ashcroft can do that. — Jon Stewart

Ending mass surveillance of private phone calls under the Patriot Act is a historic victory for the rights of every citizen. Yet while we have reformed this one program, many others remain. — Edward Snowden

The Patriot Act has increased the flow of information within our government and it has helped break up terrorist cells in the United States of America. And the United States Congress was right to renew the terrorist act
the Patriot Act. — George W. Bush

Congress passed the deeply flawed Patriot Act and authorized the invasion of Iraq. It even gave its retroactive approval to warrantless wiretapping. — Andrew Rosenthal

I say, that Power must never be trusted without a check. — John Adams

I call it the 'House of Reprehensibles.' We don't have any real political resistance to this growth of the domestic state across the board. So I'm much more focused on that than on the Patriot Act, which is a real effort, however inept, to deal with a real problem. — M. Stanton Evans

In a country where Americans sense, quite genuinely, that their freedoms have been taken away by the government - as in the U.S. Patriot Act, as in NSA surveillance - people feel powerless. — Jay Parini

The Patriot Act is certainly a concern; all of those things are dangerous. I think more important than me preaching is that we as a nation have to have the debate. I don't know what the answers are. I just know that if the idea is to say talking about it makes you unpatriotic, I've got to call your bluff on that. — George Clooney

No one in their right mind can say to me with a straight face that the Patriot Act has not aggregated the Fourth Amendment. — Peter Camejo

After we were hit on September 11, 2001, we were in a state of national shock. Less than six weeks later, on October 26 2001, the U.S.A. Patriot Act was passed by a Congress that had little chance to debate it; many said that they scarcely had time to read it. — Naomi Wolf

The Patriot Act is essential to our continued success in the war on terror here at home. — Mike Pence

It's disingenuous and wrong to say that the attorney general's expanded powers in the Patriot Act come with adequate oversight by the courts, ... In reality, the most troubling provisions in the law make judges little more than rubber stamps in Justice Department investigations. — Anthony Romero

He shook his head. "No, they never went. He checked and it turns out the Kavach plans are still considered active material and are still on file at Public Works." "Fantastic," said Xela. "So we can go see them." Nate shook his head. "Nope. That's where it ends. They're sealed records." Tim's eyebrows went up. "Sealed?" "Yep. The same way they seal plans for things like the Federal Building or parts of the state capitol or embassies. The guy emailed me to explain why he couldn't tell me anything. He even said he has to make a note in the file that I asked about them because of some Patriot Act thing. — Peter Clines

But even though nobody from the government ever says anything out loud about a lack of evidence being the real reason nobody from these companies goes to jail, we're all - including reporters who cover this stuff - still supposed to accept that as the real explanation. It's a particular feature of modern American government officials, particularly Democratic Party types, that they often expect the press and the public to give them credit for their unspoken excuses. They'll vote yea on the Iraq war and the Patriot Act and nay for a public option or an end to torture or a bill to break up the banks. Then they'll cozy up to you privately and whisper that of course they're with you in spirit on those issues, but politically it just wasn't possible to vote that way. And then they start giving you their reasons. — Matt Taibbi

Two of the most long-awaited legislative wet dreams of the Washington Insiders Club - an energy bill and a much-delayed highway bill - breezed into law. One mildly nervous evening was all it took to pass through the House the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), for years now a primary strategic focus of the battle-in-Seattle activist scene. And accompanied by scarcely a whimper from the Democratic opposition, a second version of the notorious USA Patriot Act passed triumphantly through both houses of Congress, with most of the law being made permanent this time. — Matt Taibbi

Ron Paul warned everyone that the Patriot Act could be used against innocent American citizens. His critics said he was siding with terrorists. Now, either A. Ron Paul was right. Or B. All Verizon users are terrorists. — Jack Hunter

The Patriot Act is ludicrous. Terrorists have proved that they are interested in total genocide, not subtle little hacks of the U.S. infrastructure, yet the government wants a blank search warrant to spy and snoop on everyone's communications. — Kevin Mitnick

The power of the Executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law and particularly to deny him the judgement of his peers is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government whether Nazi or Communist. — Winston S. Churchill

I spent seven years of my life in the immediate aftermath of September 11th doing this work, working with the Patriot Act, working with our law enforcement, working with the surveillance community to make sure that we keep America safe. — Chris Christie

We prosecuted two of the biggest terrorism cases in the world and stopped Fort Dix from being attacked by six American radicalized Muslims from a Mosque in New Jersey because we worked with the Muslim American community to get intelligence and we used the Patriot Act to get other intelligence to make sure we did those cases. This is the difference between actually been a federal prosecutor, actually doing something, and not just spending your life as one of hundred debating it. — Chris Christie

Today it is becoming harder to speak out, with the inception of the Patriot Act, the president has legislated free speech to be a crime. — Frank Serpico

There comes a time, there comes a time in the history of nations when fear and complacency allow power to accumulate and liberty and privacy to suffer. That time is now and I will not let the Patriot Act, the most unpatriotic of acts go unchallenged. — Rand Paul

You never want to give up your liberty, even if you are told it is for security. The Patriot Act is a perfect example of giving up liberty for security. It says let us tap your phones so we can keep safe. — Benjamin Franklin

This thing called Patriot Act, through which we abdicated a lot of our civil rights to defend the country against terrorism, it's a four-year story. — Neil Young

I would far rather over-estimate the threat [imposed by the Patriot Act] and be proven wrong than to underestimate the threat and wake up one morning in a world where the 21st century's J Edgar Hoover has the power to blackmail anyone in America. — Tim Lee

We will use all lawful tools at our disposal, and that includes authorities under the renewed PATRIOT Act. We firmly believe that our intelligence gathering tools must enable us to collect the information we need to protect the American people. — John O. Brennan

The government's collection authority, under the Patriot Act, is basically limitless. They can get the medical records and financial records, gun purchase records. And it also becomes part of another important issue that relates to the FISA court and the rest of the debate. It almost becomes a secret law, like there are two Patriot Acts. The one you read on the laptop essentially leads you to believe that there's some connection to terror . — Ron Wyden

Since its enactment in the weeks following the September 11 terrorist attacks, the tools in the Patriot Act have been used by law enforcement to stop more than 400 terrorist threats to our families and communities. — Jim Gerlach

In the last four years under the Patriot Act, we have seen a great increase in the ability of law enforcement officials to investigate and track terrorists. — Mike Pence

When the American people find out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will be stunned and they will be angry. — Ron Wyden

One of the first items of Congressional business in 2006 will be an effort to renew the USA Patriot Act. — Roger Wicker

The Democrats were in the majority in the U.S. Senate when we voted for the Iraq war and passed the U.S. Patriot Act. It's not enough to be in the majority, you have to stand for something. — Russ Feingold

From a shamanic perspective, the psychic blockade that prevents otherwise intelligent adults from considering the future of our world - our obvious lack of future, if we continue on our present path - reveals an occult dimension. It is like a programming error written into the software designed for the modern mind, which has endless energy to spend on the trivial and treacly, sports statistic or shoe sale, but no time to spare for the torments of the Third World, for the mass extinction of species to perpetuate a way of life without a future, for the imminent exhaustion of fossil fuel reserves, or for the fine print of the Patriot Act. This psychic blockade is reinforced by a vast propaganda machine spewing out crude as well as sophisticated distractions, encouraging individuals to see themselves as alienated spectators of their culture, rather than active participants in a planetary ecology. — Daniel Pinchbeck

We are a nation of laws and liberties, not of a knock in the night. So it is time to end the era of John Ashcroft. That starts with replacing the Patriot Act with a new law that protects our people and our liberties at the same time. — John F. Kerry

The Patriot Act has practically obliterated the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. It was supposed to be temporary, but there are so many things that the Government likes about the power that it gives, they keep renewing it. — Kenneth Eade

I believe the Patriot Act strikes the right balance needed to protect our freedom and security. — Bill Owens

The Patriot Act removed major legal barriers that prevented the law enforcement, intelligence, and national defense communities from talking and coordinating their work to protect the American people and our national security. — Jon Porter

The PATRIOT Act brought down the wall separating intelligence agencies from law enforcement and other entities charged with protecting the Nation from terrorism. — Chris Chocola

I will not let the Patriot Act, the most unpatriotic of acts, go unchallenged. At the very least, we should debate. We should debate whether or not we are going to relinquish our rights, or whether or not we are going to have a full and able debate over whether or not we can live within the Constitution, or whether or not we have to go around the Constitution. — Rand Paul

I really think the Patriot Act violates our Constitution. It was, it is, an illegal act. The Congress, the Senate and the president cannot change the Constitution. — Peter Camejo

Stellar Wind blew past the Supreme Court on the authority of a dubious opinion sent to the White House the week that the Patriot Act became law. It came from John Yoo, a thirty-four-year-old lawyer in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel who had clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas. Yoo wrote that the Constitution's protections against warrantless searches and seizures did not apply to military operations in the United States. The NSA was a military agency; Congress had authorized Bush to use military force; therefore he had the power to use the NSA against anyone anywhere in America. The — Tim Weiner

The means of defence agst. foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. — James Madison

Since losing his reelection in 2002, Barr has lost not only his power but also many of his friends. It doesn't help that after alienating nearly every Democrat with impeachment, he spent the next five years alienating his fellow Republicans - railing against the invasion of Iraq, the PATRIOT Act, and the Bush administration in general. — Wil S. Hylton

The Patriot Act addresses various subjects. Some sections are beneficial and enhance our national security. — Mike Honda

Secrecy begets tyranny. — Robert A. Heinlein

In the aftermath of 9/11, the Patriot Act was rushed to the floor. Several hundred pages. Nobody read it ... But people voted because they were fearful and people said there could be another attack and Americans will blame me if I don't vote on this. — Rand Paul

Prior to the passage of the Patriot Act, it was very difficult - often impossible - for us to share information with the Central Intelligence Agency, with NSA, with the other intelligence agencies, and likewise, for them to share information with us. — Robert Mueller

The Patriot Act closed dangerous gaps in America's law enforcement and intelligence capabilities, gaps that terrorists exploited when they attacked us. — George W. Bush

We must erase bin Laden's ugly legacy, not extend it: by ending the Patriot Act's erosion of our civil liberties, we can protect the freedoms that make America worth fighting for. — Aaron Swartz

People talk about the Patriot Act that was passed immediately in the wake of September 11. What the Patriot Act did was break down the walls between the various agencies. — Robert Mueller

I will also continue to strongly oppose any reauthorization of the Patriot Act that does not protect the rights and freedoms of law-abiding Americans with no connection to terrorism. — Russ Feingold

The Patriot Act followed 9-11 as smoothly as the suspension of the Weimar constitution after the Reichstag Fire Decree. — Srda Trifkovic

George W. Bush's legacy will always be defined by the events of September
11, 2001, which provided him with something of a delayed mandate.
Without 9/11, there would have been no unconstitutional Patriot Act, no
Homeland Security Department, no decade-long occupation of Iraq and
Afghanistan, and no open-ended "war on terror." As such, it is important to
look closely at exactly what really happened on 9/11/2001. — Donald Jeffries

Suspicionless surveillance has no place in a democracy. The next 60 days are a historic opportunity to rein in the NSA, but the only one who can end the worst of its abuses is you. Call your representatives and tell them that the unconstitutional 'bulk collection' of Americans' private records under Section 215 of the Patriot Act must end. — Edward Snowden

The Patriot Act, passed overwhelmingly but hastily after 9/11, allows the FBI to obtain telecommunication, financial, and credit records without a court order. — Rebecca MacKinnon

I think it's dawning on some Democrats that obstructing the Patriot Act, like they've been obstructing everything else, is bad for them politically. — Karl Rove

Now that Bin Laden dead, can we get our civil liberties back?
That George Bush stole with the Patriot Act? — Ras Kass

NAFTA and GATT have about as much to do with free trade as the Patriot Act has to do with liberty. — Michael Badnarik

Since we enacted the PATRIOT Act almost three years ago, there has been tremendous public debate about its breadth and implications on due process and privacy. — Howard Berman

We all deserve credit for this new surveillance state that we live in because we the people voted for the Patriot Act. Democrats and Republicans alike ... We voted for the people who voted for it, and then voted for the people who reauthorized it, then voted for the people who re-re-authorize d it. — Stephen Colbert

The 'Total Information Awareness' project is truly diabolical - mostly because of the legal changes which have made it possible in the first place. As a consequence of the Patriot Act, government now has access to all sorts of private and commercial databases that were previously off limits. — John Perry Barlow

Here at home, we need to do two fundamental things. Number one, we need to recognize that technology has moved on. The Patriot Act was signed in 2001, roughly. The iPhone was invented in 2007. The iPad was invented in 2011. Snapchat and Twitter, all the rest of it, have been around just for several years. Technology has moved on, and the terrorists have moved on with it. — Ted Cruz

It's funny that we think of libraries as quiet demure places where we are shushed by dusty, bun-balancing, bespectacled women. The truth is libraries are raucous clubhouses for free speech, controversy and community. Librarians have stood up to the Patriot Act, sat down with noisy toddlers and reached out to illiterate adults. Libraries can never be shushed. — Paula Poundstone

It is no response to assert that the Patriot Act has been useful; what you need to explain is how any particular safeguard would have so diluted investigative powers that it would have frustrated an investigation and created a security harm outweighing the benefit to civil liberties. If you'd rather trade scary stories, that's fine too - just let me know so I can buy a bag of marshmallows before our next round. — Julian Sanchez

We are in an era where censorship is creeping back in through the Patriot Act and where people are.. being intimidated not to speak about what we should be speaking about,. — Gerald Nicosia

In America, after 9/11, and after the death of bin Laden, and after two wars, one of them fought, a lot of people think, on false pretenses, and definitely post the Patriot Act, there are a lot of these questions about what can we do to our citizens in order to prevent the next attack. — Gideon Raff

Every American, regardless of their background, has the right to live free of unwarranted government intrusion. Repealing the worst provisions of the Patriot Act will reign in this gross abuse of power and restore to everyone our basic Constitutional rights. — Pete Stark

While the debate on the Patriot Act is far from over, it is important that all Americans continue in this dialogue and work together to ensure greater security for our nation. — Jo Bonner

When the September 11th attacks happened, only about a year later, the crypto community was holding its breath because here was a time when we just had an absolutely horrific terrorist attack on U.S. soil, and if the NSA and the FBI were unhappy with anything, Congress was ready to pass any law they wanted. The PATRIOT Act got pushed through very, very quickly with bipartisan support and very, very little debate, yet it didn't include anything about encryption. — Matt Blaze

By tearing down the wall between law enforcement and the intelligence community, we have been able to share information in a way that was virtually impossible before the Patriot Act. — John Ashcroft

The attorney general also spelled out some of the authorities the FBI would use under the Patriot Act, which passed the Senate that same day: capturing e-mail addresses, tapping cell phones, opening voice-mails, culling credit card and bank account numbers from the Internet. All of this would be done under law, he said, with subpoenas and search warrants. But the Patriot Act was not enough for the White House. On October 4, Bush commanded the National Security Agency to work with the FBI in a secret program code-named Stellar Wind. The — Tim Weiner

In the wake of the Patriot Act, during the second administration of George W., you made a series of small, handheld weapons. The rule was that each weapon had to be assembled from household items within minutes. You'd been gay-bashed before, two black eyes while waiting in line for a burrito (you ran after him, of course). Now you thought, if the government comes for its citizens, we should be prepared, even if our weapons are pathetic. Your art-weapons included a steak knife affixed to a bottle of ranch dressing and mounted on an axe handle, a dirty sock sprouting nails, a wooden stump with a clump of urethane resin stuck to one end with dull bolts protruding from it, and more. — Maggie Nelson

Since 2001, the Patriot Act has provided the means to detect and disrupt terrorist threats against the U.S. Prior to enactment of the law, major legal barriers prevented intelligence, national defense, and law enforcement agencies from working together and sharing information. — Roger Wicker

How will we defend ourselves if the Patriot Act expires? Well, perhaps we could just rely on the Constitution and demonstrate exactly how traditional judicial warrants can gather all the info we need - and how bulk collection really hasn't worked. — Rand Paul

The Patriot Act allows and provides a basis for an exchange of information. — John Ashcroft

Go to the internet and go to the FBI website and go to their international list of top ten terrorists. You will see Bin Laden there, bring his name up and his picture. Amazingly, all the charges: the embassy of '98 and this other stuff is all listed. But, ironically nothing on 9/11. NOTHING! Now when the FBI was pressed as to why 9/11 wasn't included, their response was "We don't have enough evidence." Now, people, if you're like me that is extremely disturbing; we've fought two wars, we've changed our entire foreign policy and we've had the PATRIOT act put on us, all, supposedly, because of Osama Bin Laden! — Jesse Ventura

After careful deliberation, I voted today to reauthorize the Patriot Act. — Jim Gerlach

You'd think after 8 years of things called 'The Patriot Act' and 'No Child Left Behind' they would know that we have figured out the 'Call it what it ain't' PR ploy by now, but ... um ... no. — Hal Sparks

We are expected to believe that anyone who objects to the Department of Homeland Security or the USA Patriot Act is a terrorist, and that the only way to preserve our freedom is to hand it over to the government for safekeeping. — L. Neil Smith

I listen a little to the Democrats, and if one of them gets elected, we are going on defense," Giuliani continued. "We will wave the white flag on Iraq. We will cut back on the Patriot Act, electronic surveillance, interrogation and we will be back to our pre-September 11 attitude of defense. — Rudy Giuliani

I will not counter the insanity of the PATRIOT Act with an overblown fear of my rights being taken away. — Penn Jillette

Journalist:
Congressman Kucinich, I believe you're the only one here who voted against the PATRIOT act right away after 9/11. Why is that?
His Reply:
Because I read it. — Dennis Kucinich

To be patriotic is to be able to question government policy in times of crisis. To be patriotic is to stand up for the Bill of Rights and the Constitution in times of uncertainty and insecurity. To be patriotic is to speak up against the powerful in defense of the weak and the voiceless. To be patriotic is to be willing to pay the price to preserve our freedoms, dignity, and rights. To be patriotic is to challenge the abuses of the PATRIOT Act. — Sami Al-Arian

Secondly, there are such things as roving wiretaps. Now, by the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires - a wiretap requires a court order. Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, when you think Patriot Act, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution. — George W. Bush

JA: We wouldn't mind a leak from Google, which would be, I think,
probably all the Patriot Act requests.275
ES: Which would be [whispers] illegal.
[Nervous chuckles]
JA: It depends on the jurisdiction ... !
[Chuckles]
ES: We are a US
JA: There are higher laws. First Amendment, you know.
ES: No, I've actually spent quite a bit of time on this question because I am
in great trouble because I have given a series of criticisms about Patriot I
and Patriot II, because they're nontransparent, because the judge's orders
are hidden and so forth and so on. The answer is that the laws are quite
clear about Google in the US. We couldn't do it. It would be illegal. — Julian Assange

For too long, opponents of the PATRIOT Act have transformed this law into a grossly distorted caricature that bears no relation to the legislation itself. — Jim Sensenbrenner

Say what you will about Americans, but one thing they are not is passive. The Bush administration may have pushed through the Patriot Act weeks after 11 September, but, as the American public got to grips with how the law was affecting their individual rights, their protests grew loud and angry. — Heather Brooke

Civil libertarians have raised concerns that some of the Patriot Act's provisions infringe on Constitutional rights. Those concerns are not supported by the facts. — Roger Wicker

Congress and the White House are working out their scheme for pushing through a healthcare 'reform' bill that has more pages than the U.S. Constitution has words. I guarantee you that not a single member of the House or Senate has a complete understanding of that legislation any more than they understood all the implications of the USA PATRIOT Act back in 2001. — Butch Otter