The Dispatch
On April 15, 2026, President Donald J. Trump posted to Truth Social in support of a clean 18-month reauthorization of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which is scheduled to expire on April 20. The post acknowledged that the program had been used against the President personally and stated that he was willing to “risk giving up his Rights and Privileges as a Citizen” in order to support its renewal. The post closed with the words “Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DONALD J. TRUMP.” The House is scheduled to vote on H.R. 8035, the reauthorization legislation, this week.
On April 10, 2024, the President posted to Truth Social: “KILL FISA, IT WAS ILLEGALLY USED AGAINST ME, AND MANY OTHERS. THEY SPIED ON MY CAMPAIGN!!!” That post preceded a procedural vote on the prior reauthorization by several hours. Nineteen Republican members joined Democrats to defeat the procedural motion. Section 702 was subsequently extended through a defense spending bill and reauthorized in 2024 with 56 amendments, none of which included a warrant requirement for searches of Americans’ communications.
Section 702 authorizes the collection of digital communications of foreign nationals located outside the United States without an individualized court order. The program also collects communications of American citizens, which federal agencies including the FBI, CIA, NSA, and National Counterterrorism Center may then search without a warrant in what oversight organizations have described as backdoor searches. The FBI conducted 7,413 such searches of Americans’ data in the 2024-2025 window, a figure that represents a 35 percent increase over the prior year. Twenty-eight percent of those searches returned results. The FISA Court, in findings dated April 9, 2026, noted that compliance problems the Department of Justice had reported as resolved are in fact ongoing across the intelligence community.
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, who as a Hawaii congresswoman sponsored legislation to repeal Section 702 in its entirety, supports the clean extension. House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, who voted against reauthorization in 2024, is currently whipping votes in favor of it. The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, which in 2023 issued a report describing Section 702 as presenting significant privacy and civil liberties risks, was effectively dissolved in January 2025. Representative Anna Paulina Luna of Florida has indicated she will attach the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act to the reauthorization bill. Speaker Johnson told Representative Luna she could bear responsibility for thousands of American deaths if the program lapses.
The program expires in five days. The President has said he is willing to give up his rights and privileges. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Source Block
Original source: Truth Social @realDonaldTrump
Archived copy: archive.org
Screenshot on file: screenshots/trump-fisa-702-reauthorization-rights-privileges.png
Retrieved: 2026-04-15
Additional sources:
- Trump “KILL FISA” April 2024: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/apr/10/donald-trump-rails-against-renewing-governments-sp/
- CNN — FISA procedural vote defeated April 2024: https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/10/politics/trump-fisa-speaker-johnson-house-republicans/index.html
- NPR — full FISA 702 context: https://www.npr.org/2026/04/14/nx-s1-5768270/what-to-know-about-section-702-surveillance
- CNN — White House push for clean extension: https://www.cnn.com/2026/04/13/politics/fisa-section-702-suveillance-law-expiration-congress
- Axios — White House urges clean extension, Johnson vote count: https://www.axios.com/2026/04/13/white-house-fisa-reauthorization-mike-johnson
- Roll Call — House Rules Committee, ongoing compliance failures: https://rollcall.com/2026/04/14/house-starts-uncertain-push-to-reauthorize-key-surveillance-authority/
- Brennan Center — FISC April 9 findings, ongoing violations: https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/section-702-foreign-intelligence-surveillance-act
- State of Surveillance — FBI searches up 35%, 28% return rate: https://stateofsurveillance.org/news/fisa-702-9-days-ex-spy-chiefs-fisc-renewal-countdown-april-2026/
- Reason — Gabbard and Trump reversals: https://reason.com/2026/03/27/trump-backs-section-702-reauthorization-after-once-calling-to-kill-fisa/
