Lawmakers to FBI head: 'We write to request information about the FBI's illegal spying activities'

Republican Reps. Andy Biggs of Arizona and Jim Jordan of Ohio in a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray highlighted a recently declassified Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) memorandum opinion and order.

"According to a recently released opinion from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has been seriously and systemically abusing its warrantless electronic surveillance authority," the lawmakers said in the letter. "We write to request information about the FBI's illegal spying activities."

The congressmen pressed Wray to "explain why almost a year after the OIG's report about FISA abuses, the FISC found the FBI to still be abusing its warrantless surveillance authority under section 702" and to supply "a detailed accounting of every instance since December 2019 in which the FBI has queried, accessed, otherwise used information obtained pursuant to section 702 for purposes unrelated to national security."

They also asked the FBI director to detail what moves he has made "in the wake of the FISC's November 2020 memorandum opinion and order to prevent the FBI from using its section 702 authorities to surveil, investigate, or otherwise examine U.S. citizens."