Reply #4: Thanks dbeach and Merry Fitzmas to you

[seemslikeadream]

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has said the administration prefers the House bill and objects to some of these new restrictions in the Senate version. The differences are to be resolved in a Senate-House conference.

Specifically, the groups endorsed a Senate provision that would require federal agents to provide to a court that sits in secret to issue Patriot Act warrants a statement of facts showing "some linkage between the records sought and an individual suspected of being a terrorist or spy."

Currently the government merely has to certify it is conducting an authorized investigation without providing any facts connecting the records to actual suspects.

Going beyond even the Senate bill, the groups said that provision requiring a factual linkage also should be added to a separate Patriot Act section which allows agents to gather business records of financial institutions by issuing a "national security letter" without any court approval.