What’s really a danger to democracy is allowing government to spy on political candidates

Newsmax: FISA is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance court, and they have warrants that they can issue so they can listen to your phone calls. But the standard that is used by the government to give a warrant is they have to have probable cause that you’re associated with a foreign government.

That’s not what the Constitution says. If you’re an American the Constitution says they have to have probable cause that you’ve committed a crime. And they can search person, place and they can individualize with an individualized warrant. So the warrant is a lower standard, and I’m with going for foreigners and listening to phone calls from people we think might attack us.

.@RandPaul speaks out against the precedent set by "politically-motivated" FISA warrants out to investigate former President Trump.

"Too many people on the left, because they hate President Trump so much, can't understand how dangerous this would be." pic.twitter.com/zpJmm3TZgj — Newsmax (@newsmax) September 30, 2021

But for an American, we need to use the U.S. Constitution and the Fourth Amendment. So the FISA court, where they use FISA warrants to go after President Trump, in I think a politically motivated way, they didn’t use the Constitution. The standard of the Constitution is here (raising hand high), the standard for FISA is here (lowering hand). They stooped down to using something we use on foreigners to using it against a presidential candidate.

I think too many people on the left, because they hate President Trump so much, can’t understand how dangerous this would be. This is incredibly dangerous whether you’re a Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, whatever you are, to let the power of government use this less than constitutional standard to go after your political enemies and listen to their phone calls… invade their privacy. It’s very, very dangerous to democracy.

All these people on the left, every day, saying ‘Oh Donald Trump’s a danger to democracy’… What’s really a danger to democracy is allowing government to be strong enough that they can investigate political candidates of either party.