“We passed the Freedom Act about a month ago here in the House,” Representative Massie says, “but the bill got watered down significantly in committee. Then, when it came out of committee, it went behind closed doors in negotiations with the intelligence community, and when it came out to the House we weren’t allowed to offer amendments. Roughly half of the cosponsors dropped our support, because we didn’t even recognize the bill at that point.”
Representative Massie concedes that further reform is needed, and predicts that his amendment will not make it into law, given that the defense-appropriations bill is likely to be superseded by an omnibus spending bill down the road.
The good news is that support for reform is apparently deep and bipartisan. “The thing that surprised me last night was we got a majority of Republicans and a majority of Democrats,” Representative Massie says. “I expected a majority of Democrats, but wasn’t sure a majority of Republicans would support it. The opposition came from the intelligence and judiciary committees, which have jurisdiction over this. The leader and the whip were also against it. But the good news is that the whip-elect [Steve Scalise of Lousiana] and the conference chair [Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington] did vote for it. Nancy Pelosi voted for it as well.”
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