Larry Klayman, founder of government watchdog Freedom Watch, tells
Newsmax TV he's not discouraged by a court decision favoring the Obama administration in his lawsuit over the NSA's collection of the phone records of hundreds of millions of Americans.
"We're still going to win it," Klayman, a former federal prosecutor, said Friday on "The Steve Malzberg Show."
"This is tyranny. If King George III had had access to the NSA, [our Founding Fathers] would have never made it to Philadelphia to sign the Declaration of Independence. They would have gotten arrested and executed."
Story continues below video.
Watch Newsmax TV on DirecTV Ch. 349, DISH Ch. 223 and Verizon FiOS Ch. 115. Get Newsmax TV on your cable system — Click Here Now
On Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
reversed a lower court ruling that said the NSA's bulk collection of phone records — which is supposed to sniff out terrorists — likely violates the Constitution's ban on unreasonable searches.
Klayman's lawsuit opposing the collection of data got a boost when, in 2013, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled it was likely unconstitutional, but put his decision on hold until an appeal was decided.
Last May, an appeals court in New York ruled that the USA Patriot Act could not be interpreted to allow the NSA's bulk collection of phone surveillance. But the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court, which oversees the NSA program, ruled in June that the New York court erred.
Friday's appeals court's ruling is up in the air because Congress has passed legislation to replace the program by the end of the year.
"The outrage here is that the court has taken two years to make a ruling on this since Judge Leon issued his original ruling and a first-year law student with little to no experience could have written this on one day," Klayman said.
"It's irresponsible, it's unbelievable that they would take this amount of time to do this because to do it in that way allows these constitutional violations to continue."
Klayman said he lays the blame on Republican judges who "are doing what the Republican establishment wants."
"Like Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, like Sen. John McCain, [Sen.] Lindsey Graham, even the presidential candidates, [Sen.] Marco Rubio and Gov. Chris Christie think this is peachy keen. This is the way these people pay back those who gave them their jobs or seek higher appointment," he said.
"That's why Donald Trump is so popular these days, because the Republican establishment – whether it's judges, whether it's in the legislature, whether it's an executive branch – if they win the presidency [they don't] represent the American people anymore. They represent themselves.
"They scratch each other's backs and Trump is going up against that and you've seen that in this instance, these judges have behaved in an outrageous, dishonest way because they didn't need to take nearly two years to do this decision."
Freedom Watch, based in Ocala, Fla., describes itself as a political advocacy group dedicated to protecting the right to privacy, free speech, civil liberties.