The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), enacted in 1978 as part of the Watergate reforms, oversees and approves surveillance warrants against foreign spies and terrorists in the US. The secretive FISA Court bypasses normal warrant requirements and allows the government to conduct surveillance using classified information.

The Mueller probe recently brought FISA into the public eye after it was revealed that the FBI abused FISA for the unjust surveillance of Trump campaign member Carter Page. To shed some much-needed light on the issue, John Yoo joined the show to discuss his experience practicing before the FISA Court, the pros and cons of FISA, what Congress ought to do and whether the Court needs to be reformed.

John Yoo is a Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley, and a visiting scholar at AEI. He served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of the Legal Counsel of the US Department of Justice, where he worked on constitutional and national security matters, as General Counsel of the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary, and as a law clerk to Justice Clarence Thomas.

Download the transcript here.