Johnson’s FISA extension fails spectacularly as spy powers poised to expire

WASHINGTON (CN) — House Speaker Mike Johnson was furious Thursday after a proposed three-week extension to an expansive government surveillance authority went down in flames in Congress, just hours before the authority is set to expire.

And while an apoplectic Johnson lambasted Democrats for what he said was partisan gamesmanship over President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the country’s intelligence services, his short-term patch to the controversial spy powers failed to capture even a simple majority in the Republican-controlled House.

Capitol Hill has been deadlocked for weeks over legislation renewing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — a provision granting U.S. intelligence broad legal authority to conduct surveillance on foreign nationals abroad without a warrant. Though privacy hawks have long been skeptical of the spy powers, the recent stalemate was primarily motivated by Trump’s announcement that his ally Bill Pulte would replace Tulsi Gabbard as director of national intelligence.

With the prospects of a FISA extension looking bleak in the Senate, House Republicans said Wednesday that they would move ahead with their own legislation keeping the program online through July 2. But the measure failed spectacularly in a floor vote Thursday morning.

Johnson’s FISA patch, brought up under a suspension of House rules, needed a two-thirds majority to pass. The bill, however, failed to capture a simple majority on the floor. Nearly every Democrat, 199 lawmakers, voted against the measure, joined by 19 Republicans.

But speaking to reporters following the vote, the House speaker laid the blame squarely on Democrats over their opposition to Pulte.

“It is shameful and it is very, very dangerous,” Johnson said, accusing congressional Democrats of holding the FISA extension as a “political hostage.”

“Their excuse is that they’re upset about a very temporary appointment, that the president of the United States has already said would be very temporary in nature, while he searches for and selects a new director of national intelligence.”

Trump earlier this month named Pulte, currently director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, as acting director of national intelligence following Gabbard’s departure from the role.

Amid uncertainty about Pulte — who has no national security experience and does not hold a security clearance — from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, the White House insisted that his appointment would be temporary. But Trump recently doubled down on Pulte’s appointment, announcing on social media that he will take over as director of national intelligence next week.

Critics of Pulte’s ascent, particularly Democrats, point to his track record as head of the government’s federal housing agency during which he targeted political enemies of the president with mortgage fraud investigations.

Still, Johnson said Thursday that Trump was looking for a full-time replacement for Gabbard, arguing it was an “important process that takes some time, thought and deliberation.”

Speaking during a separate news conference Thursday morning, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries slammed Pulte as “deeply unqualified, deeply unserious and deeply dangerous,” pointing out that federal statute governing directors of national intelligence require them to have national security experience.

The top House Democrat reiterated that the only path for his party back toward “good faith negotiation” with Republicans on FISA would be to reverse Pulte’s nomination.

“It is highly irresponsible to try to elevate Bill Pulte, as we’ve made publicly clear, repeatedly, to Republicans and the administration,” Jeffries added.

In the Senate, meanwhile, Republicans were slated Thursday afternoon to attempt a last-ditch extension to FISA authority via unanimous consent, a process that would allow the patch to pass via voice vote. Democrats, however, are likely to object to that gambit.

Both the House and Senate are scheduled to be out of session next week for the Juneteenth holiday.

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