“Our goal is not to gut the Patriot Act,” said Bob Barr, the group’s chairman and a former Republican congressman, in a March 22 press release. “Our goal is to ensure that Congress reviews the act, as members intended when they voted for the bill with the sunset provisions three years ago.”
PCRB outlined its concerns in a March 22 letter to President Bush that urged him to reconsider his “unqualified endorsement of the most intrusive, unchecked powers temporarily granted by the Act.” The coalition is pressing for modifications to what it calls “extreme provisions of the law”: Section 213, which allows searches of people’s homes and business without notice; Section 802, which the group says too broadly expands the definition of domestic terrorism; and Section 215.
The group’s members include Americans for Tax Reform, the American Conservative Union, the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Policy Center, the Eagle Forum, and the Second Amendment Foundation.
Posted March 25, 2005.