One day after New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie defended the NSA’s surveillance tactics, Sen. Mike Lee took direct aim at the potential 2016 candidate Tuesday, calling him out for saying civil liberties cannot be enjoyed “if you’re in a coffin.”
Appearing on “Now With Alex Wagner” Tuesday, the Utah senator called the New Jersey governor’s comment “disingenuous,” adding further that Christie should retract his statement.
Lee didn’t stop there with his criticism of the outspoken governor, telling Wagner that while he disagrees with some of members of the 2016 field, he “particularly disagree[s]” with Christie. The tea party favorite also labeled Christie’s views on NSA surveillance “unnecessarily inflammatory” and “demeaning of the political process.”
“Look, none of us wants to be in that position. But it is a false choice. It is an absolute false choice to say that you either have to reauthorize, to extend the Patriot Act authority as is, without modification, without protections for the American people, or we’re all going to die,” Lee said of Christie. “That is a disingenuous comment, and I think he should retract that statement.”
“This is an issue that dates back hundreds of years in many respects. In some ways, it involves new technology, but in other ways dates back hundreds of years,” Lee argued. “One of the principles that the founding fathers agreed upon was that the government shouldn’t be engaged in the use of general warrants, just going out and saying send us all your information in case we might want to search it later for some kind of investigation. That’s wrong. The American people don’t like that. [The USA Freedom Act] would fix that.”
“I disagree with some of [the GOP 2016 candidates]. I don’t know where they all stand, to be honest. But I will say there are some with whom I disagree, but I particularly disagree with what Mr. Christie has said. I think it’s simply wrong,” Lee continued.
“It’s unnecessarily inflammatory to say you have to choose between either reauthorizing this law, which is controversial, which offends a lot of people’s sense of the law, sense of the Constitution, a sense of what the government ought to be doing,” Lee said. “You’ve got to choose between that or death. That’s wrong, as a matter of fact, and I think it’s imprecise and I think it’s demeaning of the political process in which we ought to have an open, honest discussion based on facts rather than emotion.”
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