A DC appeals court has lifted an injunction against the NSA phone call records program.
Washington Post Reports:
An appeals court in the District of Columbia has lifted an injunction against the National Security Agency’s call records program on grounds that the plaintiff has not proved his own phone records were collected and so lacks standing to sue.
The move lifts an injunction against the NSA’s collection that had been imposed –and temporarily stayed—by a District Court judge in December 2013.
In that ruling, U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon found that a lawsuit by Larry Klayman, a conservative legal activist, “demonstrated a substantial likelihood of success” in proving his Fourth Amendment right to privacy was violated and that the NSA program was likely unconstitutional.
But the appeals court reversed Leon’s judgment. Klayman, wrote Circuit Court Judge Stephen F. Williams, “lack[s] direct evidence that records involving their calls have actually been collected.”
Congress in June put an end to the program, passing a law that barred the government from collecting phone and other records in bulk. But the NSA is continuing to do so as it transitions the program to phone companies by November. An appeals court in New York is hearing a challenge by the ACLU to that transition program.
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