FBI employees and agents inappropriately searched foreign surveillance data for the last names of a state senator and a U.S. senator, said a court opinion that was released Friday.
The newly disclosed finding is included in the release of a 117-page order (pdf) declassified on July 16 by the federal judiciary’s foreign intelligence surveillance court in April—a rare move as that court generally issues rulings in secret.
In the court document, issued by Judge Rudolph Contreras, an unnamed FBI analyst in June 2022 conducted four separate searches of information that was collected via the warrantless surveillance program under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) “using the last names of a U.S. Senator and a state senator.” Their names were not disclosed in the unsealed ruling….