Recent quotes:
ANNAPOLIS, Md., February 10, 2014– It’s lights out for the National Security Agency (NSA). State lawmakers in Maryland have filed emergency status legislation that seeks to cut the NSA’s Ft. Meade headquarters off from all material support stemming from the state.
“Maryland has almost become a political subdivision of the NSA,” Tenth Amendment Center Executive Director Michael Boldin said in a statement. “The agency relies heavily on state and local help. This bill bans all of it.”
House Bill 1074 (HB1074) would ban the NSA facility from all public state utilities, ban the use of NSA collected evidence in court, ban universities from partnering with the NSA and ban all political subdivisions from assisting the NSA from within the state.
Any state entity, employee or contractor refusing to comply with the law would be immediately fired and banned from all future contracts within the state.
The bill has eight Republican sponsors and has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee.
Multiple states join Maryland in their attempt to enforce anti-commandeering legislative measures against the NSA. Tennessee, Arizona, California and Washington have all filed legislation. Utah is expected to file legislation within the coming weeks.
googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1380545742536-0'); });
So far, the Maryland and Tennessee (sponsored by Sen. Campfield and Rep. Holt) legislation would have the biggest impact on the NSA. Both states have actual facilities. Meanwhile, other states are passing the legislation as a prophylactic measure.
The wave of legislative measures is being conducted by the Tenth Amendment Center, which along with the Bill of Rights Defense Committee launched the OffNow coalition last year.
condemns in the strongest possible terms the vast, systemic, blanket collection of the personal data of innocent people, often comprising intimate personal information; emphasises that the systems of mass, indiscriminate surveillance by intelligence services constitute a serious interference with the fundamental rights of citizens; stresses that privacy is not a luxury right, but that it is the foundation stone of a free and democratic society; points out, furthermore, that mass surveillance has potentially severe effects on the freedom of press, thought and speech as well as a significant potential for abuse of the information gathered against political adversaries; emphasises that these mass surveillance activities appear also to entail illegal actions by intelligence services and raise questions regarding extraterritoriality of national law.