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U. S. federal court

The United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), also called the FISA Court, is a U. S. federal court established under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA) to oversee requests for surveillance warrants against foreign spies inside the United States by federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies. FISA was created by the U. S. Congress based on the recommendations of the Senate's Church Committee, which was convened in 1975 to investigate illicit activities and civil rights abuses by the federal intelligence community. Pursuant to the law, the FISC reviews requests to conduct physical and electronic surveillance within the U. S. concerning "foreign intelligence information" between "foreign powers" and "agents of foreign powers" suspected of espionage or terrorism; such requests are made most often by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). From its opening in 1978 until 2009, the court was housed on the sixth floor of the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building;

Because of the sensitive nature of its business, the court is a "secret court" – its hearings are closed to the public. While records of the proceedings are kept, they also are unavailable to the public, although copies of some records with classified information redacted have been made public. Due to the classified nature of its proceedings, usually only attorneys licensed to practice in front of the US government are permitted to appear before the court. Because of the nature of the matters heard before it, court hearings may need to take place at any time of day or night, weekdays or weekends; thus, at least one judge must be "on call" at all times to hear evidence and decide whether or not to issue a warrant. A heavily redacted version of a 2008 appeal by Yahoo! of an order issued with respect to NSA's PRISM program had been published for the edification of other potential appellants. The identity of the appellant was declassified in June 2013.

In a July 2013 interview, Senator and privacy advocate Ron Wyden described the FISC warrant process as "the most one sided legal process in the United States". "I don't know of any other legal system or court that really doesn't highlight anything except one point of view", he said. Later in the interview he said Congress should seek to "diversify some of the thinking on the court". Elizabeth Goitein, a co director of the Liberty and National Security Program of the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, has criticized the court as being too compromised to be an impartial tribunal that oversees the work of the NSA and other U. S. intelligence activities. A related bias of the court results from what critics such as Julian Sanchez, a scholar at the Cato Institute, have described as the near certainty of the polarization or groupthink of the judges of the court. Since all of the judges are appointed by the same person (the Chief Justice of the United States), hear no opposing testimony and feel no pressure from colleagues or the public to moderate their rulings, Sanchez claims that "group polarization is almost a certainty", adding that "there's the real possibility that these judges become more extreme over time, even when they had only a mild bias to begin with". are appointed solely by the Chief Justice of the United States without confirmation or oversight by the U. S. Congress. This gives the chief justice the ability to appoint like minded judges and create a court without diversity. "The judges are hand picked by someone who, through his votes on the Supreme Court, we have come to learn has a particular view on civil liberties and law enforcement", Theodore Ruger, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, said with respect to Chief Justice John Roberts. "The way the FISA is set up, it gives him unchecked authority to put judges on the court who feel the same way he does." Since May 2014, however, four of the five judges appointed by Chief Justice Roberts to the FISA Court were appointed to their prior federal court positions by Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. There are some reform proposals. Senator Richard Blumenthal from Connecticut proposed that each of the chief judges of the 12 major appeals courts select a district judge for the surveillance court; the chief justice would still pick the review panel that hears rare appeals of the court's decisions, but six other Supreme Court justices would have to sign off. Another proposal authored by Representative Adam Schiff of California would give the president the power to nominate judges for the court, subject to Senate approval, while Representative Steve Cohen proposed that Congressional leaders pick eight of the court's members.

In November 2016, Louise Mensch reported on the news website Heat Street that, after an initial June 2016 FBI request was denied, the FISA court had granted a more narrowly focused October request from the FBI "to examine the activities of 'U. S. persons' in Donald Trump's campaign with ties to Russia". On 12 January 2017, BBC journalist Paul Wood reported that, in response to an April 2016 tip from a foreign intelligence agency to the CIA about "money from the Kremlin going into the US presidential campaign", a joint taskforce had been established including representatives of the FBI, the Department of the Treasury, the Department of Justice, the CIA, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the National Security Agency. In June 2016, lawyers from the Department of Justice applied to the FISA court for "permission to intercept the electronic records from two Russian banks". According to Wood, this application was rejected, as was a more narrowly focused request in July, and the order was finally granted by a different FISA judge on 15 October, three weeks before the presidential election. On January 19, The New York Times reported that one of its sources had claimed "intelligence reports based on some of the wiretapped communications had been provided to the White House". On 13 March, the Senate Intelligence Committee demanded that the Trump administration provide evidence to support the President Trump's claim that former President Obama had wiretapped Trump Tower. On 16 March, the Committee reported that they had seen no evidence to support Trump's accusation that the Obama administration tapped his phones during the 2016 presidential campaign. On Fox News on 14 March, commentator Andrew Napolitano said, "Three intelligence sources have informed Fox News that President Obama went outside the chain of command. He used GCHQ. What is that? It's the initials for the British intelligence spying agency. Simply by saying to them, 'The president needs transcripts of conversations involving candidate Trump's conversations' he's able to get it and there's no American fingerprints on this." Two days later, on 16 March, White House press spokesperson, Sean Spicer, read this claim to the press. A GCHQ spokesman responded: "Recent allegations made by media commentator Judge Andrew Napolitano about GCHQ being asked to conduct 'wiretapping' against the then president elect are nonsense. They are utterly ridiculous and should be ignored." On 17 March, the U. S. issued a formal apology to the United Kingdom for the accusation. On April 11, The Washington Post reported that the FBI had been granted a FISA warrant in the summer of 2016 to monitor then Trump foreign policy adviser Carter Page. According to the report, "The FBI and the Justice Department obtained the warrant targeting Carter Page's communications after convincing a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge that there was probable cause to believe Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power, in this case Russia, according to the officials." The report also states that the warrant has been renewed multiple times since its first issue. These warrants were criticized in the controversial Nunes memo for allegedly being issued on the basis of evidence gathered by politically motivated sources.

When the court was founded, it was composed of seven federal district judges appointed by the Chief Justice of the United States, each serving a seven year term, with one judge being appointed each year. In 2001, the USA PATRIOT Act expanded the court from seven to eleven judges, and required that at least three of the Court's judges live within 20 mile (32 km) of the District of Columbia. No judge may be appointed to this court more than once, and no judge may be appointed to both the Court of Review and the FISA court. Chief Justice John Roberts has appointed all of the current judges. NameCourtStartEndPresiding StartPresiding EndFISC AppointerOriginal AppointerE. D. Va.202020262023present[[United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma20232030 – –D. Minn.20232029 – –S. D. Miss.20192026 – –S. D. N. Y.20222029 – –D. N. J.20172024 – –N. D. Ohio20232030 – –D. D. C.20212028 – –D. D. C.20242030 – –D. Me.20192026 – –N. D. Ill.20182025 – –

Note that the start dates of service for some judges conflict among sources. NameCourtStartEndPresiding StartPresiding EndFISC AppointerOriginal AppointerS. D. Fla.19891992 – –C. D. Ill.19982005 – –D. D. C.2006201320092013D. Utah20042011 – –D. D. C.2014202120202021S. D. N. Y.19811984 – –D. Ariz.20022009 – –D. N. J.19972004 – –E. D. Va.19791986 – –E. D. Va.19932000 – –N. D. Ohio20022008 – –D. Ariz.19931999 – –E. D. Ky.20112013 – –D. D. C.2013202020162019D. D. C.2016202320212023M. D. Fla.20162023 – –D. N. M.20022003 – –D. Me.19871989 – –N. D. Okla.19811988 – –D. Minn.19992006 – –E. D. N. Y.20122019 – –D. Minn19851992 – –N. D. Okla.20132019 – –E. D. La.20102017 – –D. Mass.19901994 – –D. Mass.20012008 – –D. D. C.1988199519901995D. D. C.1979198219791982E. D. Va.20002007 – –D. D. C.2009201620142016E. D. N. C.20052012 – –W. D. Va.20152022 – –S. D. Tex.20032010 – –S. D. N. Y.19942001 – –D. D. C.2002200920022009D. N. J 19791985 – –D. D. C.1995200219952002E. D. Cal.19791980 – –S. D. N. Y.19851989 – –N. D. Ill.19791983 – –E. D. Pa.20082015 – –E. D. Mo.19791981 – –[[United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan19891996 – –D. Ore.20132020 – –D. Md.19861993 – –S. D. Ind.1983199019881990E. D. Va.20202023 – –N. D. Ga.19801987 – –D. D. C.19791981 – –D. D. C.20022008 – –W. D. Ky.20152022 – –D. Mass.20112018 – –E. D. La.19921999 – –N. D. N. Y.20042011 – –D. D. C.1982198819821988N. D. Fla.19962003 – –W. D. Okla.19901997 – –N. D. Fla.20062013 – –D. D. C.2007201420132014E. D. Ark.20092016 – –N. D. Ill.20082015 – –