Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) “introduced a bill Tuesday night to extend through 2020 a controversial surveillance authority under the Patriot Act,” the Washington Post reports.
The move comes as a bipartisan group of lawmakers in both chambers is preparing legislation to scale back the government’s spying powers under Section 215 of the Patriot Act. It puts McConnell and Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.), the bill’s co-sponsor, squarely on the side of advocates of the National Security Agency’s continued ability to collect millions of Americans’ phone records each day in the hunt for clues of terrorist activity.”

