Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky is suing the Obama Administration over the collection of phone metadata by the National Security Agency.
Paul will join Matt Kibbe, President of FreedomWorks, and lead counsel Ken Cuccinelli in a class action suit that will challenge the constitutionality of the NSA’s collection of time, numbers, and other information on American citizens telephone calls.
“I am filing a lawsuit against President Barack Obama because he has publicly refused to stop a clear and continuing violation of the 4th Amendment. The Bill of Rights protects all citizens from general warrants. I expect this case to go all the way to the Supreme Court and I predict the American people will win,” Senator Paul said in a press release on Wednesday.
During Paul’s announcement of the suit he claimed that it has the potential to become the largest class action suit ever on behalf on the bill of rights.
“There’s a huge and growing swell of protest in this country of people who are out raged that their records would be taken without suspicion, without a judges warrant and without individualization. This we believe will be a historic lawsuit, we think it may well be the largest class action lawsuit ever filed on behalf of the bill of rights.,” Paul said in his announcement in Washington on Wednesday.
The Obama Administration has called the NSA’s data collection lawful, noting that 15 judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court have authorized it in 3 month intervals since 2006.
Paul responded to the Obama administrations claim by deeming the 15 judge decision as illegitimate due to its happening in secret and with only the governments argument being presented.
“Many people who follow jurisprudence and legal history will tell you that the truth is achieved by having a lawyer on both sides, in a open court,” Senator Paul said to CNN’s Erin Burnett.
Along with President Obama, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, NSA Director Keith Alexander and FBI Director James Comey will all be challenged in the suit.
Paul, Kibbe and Cuccinell published a op-ed at CNN which reads:
Throughout history, governments have used the confiscation of private property, as well as bullying and surveillance techniques, to keep populations under control and maintain a continuous threat against those who would dare criticize them.
The explicit enshrinement of the right to be left alone is one of the crucial features that has defined America as such a unique and moral nation.
[….]
Since 2006, the NSA has been spying on us, treating American citizens as no more than common criminals, casting suspicion on honest people with not even a whisper of criminal activity about them. These are not the actions befitting a country that was once held up as a paragon of freedom and a model for the rest of the world.
This lawsuit is will surely please the large majority of Americans who do not agree with the intrusive spying of the NSA.
You can download the complaint and sign up to join the class action lawsuit HERE.
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This article first appeared on Eyes Open Report
