Allowing the Patriot Act's provisions on the collection of telephone records and other security measures to expire was an "irresponsible lapse," Sen. Mike Lee said Monday, and he'd like to know why the Senate has become so accustomed to legislation that is not completed until the last minute.
"We've known for four years this day was coming," the Utah Republican told CNN's "Newsroom with Carol Costello" program Monday. "We've known for months it was going to be very difficult this time around, and we could have and should have avoided it."
Lee, one of the Senate sponsors of the USA Freedom Bill, an alternative to the Patriot Act's bulk collection of telephone metadata, said that there is no way to know if the lapse will end in an act of terror, and he'd be surprised if it did, but he does not think the U.S. government should take that risk.
"So with each passing hour I think we have to ask ourselves, 'Why is it that we got into this position?'" Lee said. "Why is it that the Senate has become so accustomed to legislating by cliff, by deadline, instead of doing things in the regular order to make sure they're done in time?"
Lee said he tried to put the Senate's version of the USA Freedom Act, which he co-sponsored with Vermont Sen. Pat Leahy, on the Senate floor a few days before it recessed. His intent was that the Senate would have time at that point to pass it and get it signed before the Memorial Day recess.
"But that didn't work," he said. "Enough of my colleagues disagreed that we weren't able to move in that direction.
"It's important now for us to get this legislation passed into law, and this legislation ends bulk data collection, which is what so many Americans are concerned about, with their privacy. But it allows these Patriot Act provisions to continue protecting the American people."
Sen. Rand Paul, who blocked the action on Sunday, has been accused by several lawmakers of trying to use the issue to further his presidential ambitions, but Lee said he considers the Kentucky Republican a friend and that Paul has been "very consistent since the day he got to the United States Senate in asking for these reforms."
"These same things that are causing him to take a stand here are things that have propelled him long before he was ever a presidential candidate," said Lee. "I don't think this is mere posturing ... Although he takes a different approach here than I do, it's an approach that I understand and an approach that I respect."
But Lee does not consider the delayed response to the Patriot Act renewal a victory for National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden.
"I'm reluctant to attribute anything as a win to someone who violates U.S. law and discloses national security sensitive information," Lee told CNN. "I don't think this is necessarily a win for anyone, because I don't think we should have allowed these provisions to expire.
"I think we should have, instead, reformed them," he said. "That is what ought to happen, is what would have happened, if we were addressing this legislation and this sequence at the proper timing."
Lee, also appearing on
MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program Monday, said that lawmakers are not aware of abuses in the NSA's metadata collection program, but that "it's rife with the potential for abuse — and just as you point out that we can't point to any examples where it has been abused, it's very difficult to point to specific terrorist acts that have been thwarted by this program because of its existence."
Watch the video here.