On October 26, two senators wrote to the nation's top spy and its top lawyer. They want a secret court ruling made public. The court signed it on March 17. Reports say it deals with how agents search Americans' messages.

The law calls for a review for release within 180 days. The senators say that window closed on September 13. The ruling is still secret.

Some members of Congress say they've read it in a secure room. You can't.

The ruling comes from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. That's a federal court that works in secret and oversees the government's spying on foreign targets.

Its rulings start out classified. Congress later passed a law to bring the big ones into the light.

That law set a clock.

The senators say the clock for this ruling ran out on September 13.

The program is called Section 702. It lets agencies collect the messages of foreigners overseas without a warrant.

Americans get swept in when they talk with those targets. The FBI can then search that data for Americans.

Each year, the government asks the court to approve the program. On March 17, the court said yes. That order keeps collection going until March 2027.

The same ruling also found problems, according to news reports.

The New York Times reported in April on what it found. It cited talking points the administration sent to lawmakers. The Times said the court found that tools pulling one American's messages from the data count as searches. The same limits apply. It reportedly ordered the tools rebuilt.

The Justice Department "is appealing portions" of the ruling on those tools. Sen. Alex Padilla said so in a written question to the Attorney General.

A federal law covers rulings like this one. It tells the Director of National Intelligence to review them for release, working with the Attorney General. The review has 180 days.

After the review, the law says the ruling must be made public "to the greatest extent practicable." Blacked-out pages are allowed. The spy chief can also waive release for national security. Then a public summary from the Attorney General takes its place.

The administration's own documents say rulings like this are reviewed "within 180 days of issuance." By that count, the window closed September 13.

Seven weeks later, nothing has been made public.

On October 26, Sens. Ron Wyden and Adam Schiff, both Democrats, demanded the ruling. They asked for answers by November 6.

Before his July confirmation, spy chief Jay Clayton wrote that the government was "working arduously to expeditiously declassify" it. He said the full opinion had been made available to lawmakers. He didn't promise to release it before Congress votes. The White House, his office and the Justice Department didn't answer Wired's questions about the delay.

Much of what we know about past abuses came from rulings that got released.

In May 2023, the spy chief's office released a court ruling from April 2022. It did so under the same law. That ruling called the FBI's problems searching this data "persistent and widespread."

It listed searches tied to January 6. It listed searches of people arrested in the 2020 protests. One batch search covered 19,000 donors to a congressional campaign.

Two months later, another ruling came out. FBI staff had wrongly searched for a U.S. senator, a state senator and a state judge.

A 2015 law brought them out. It told the government to review such rulings and release what it could.

Then came 2024. In April, Congress renewed the program. It also put a 180-day limit on the review.

This year the program's legal footing slipped, and the fight over renewing it got louder in both parties. In June, the House voted down a short extension. The law behind Section 702 lapsed. The court's March order keeps the collection running anyway.

The push for release crossed party lines early.

This spring, the Senate Intelligence Committee's leaders asked for release by May 15. Its chairman is Republican Tom Cotton. Its vice chairman is Democrat Mark Warner.

In July, Attorney General Todd Blanche was asked in writing whether he'd meet the 180-day deadline. He answered, "Yes." Testifying that month, he said the department would "continue to look at" release.

The ruling still hasn't come out.

Section 702 has serious defenders.

It targets foreigners abroad. Spy agencies say it helps stop terror plots. Their fact sheets in March credited it with stopping a planned attack on a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna.

Some secrets are real. Methods and sources need protecting. A careful review takes time.

That's why the law gives the government options. It can release the ruling with parts blacked out. It can publish a summary instead. The law leaves plenty of room for secrets.

It asks for something smaller. Tell the public what the court decided about the rules.

The Fourth Amendment is plain. "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated."

Your papers today are mostly digital. They sit on servers, in texts and in email.

Congress is the people's check on how those rules get written. The court is a check on how they get used. The public release is the check on both.

Hide the ruling, and the last check stops working.

Concern about Section 702 crosses party lines, too. Rep. Morgan Griffith, a Virginia Republican, said on October 26 that any renewal needs a warrant rule. "I think there needs to be a warrant," he said. Groups asking Congress to wait range from the ACLU to the conservative-backed Project for Privacy and Surveillance Accountability.

Principles over personalities. The people who hold these tools will change. The rules will outlast them.

Maybe you've never been near a spy case. This still reaches you.

Ask yourself three questions. Do you call family in another country? Do you email a missionary your church supports? Do you trade messages with a supplier overseas?

If the person on the other end is a target, your words can land in this data. Then the FBI can search it with your name, phone number or email.

How those searches work is what this ruling reportedly covers.

You can't judge rules you aren't allowed to read.

Congress may vote on renewing the program within weeks, perhaps as part of the yearly defense bill. Your representative may vote before the public sees a single line of what the court wrote.

The people running these agencies change with every administration. The rules are supposed to hold no matter who's in the chair.

Many who served under orders know the difference between a quiet mission and a secret rulebook. A mission can stay quiet for years. The rules that bind the people carrying it out belong in the open.

Should the rules for searching Americans' messages be secret from Americans? The law's answer is narrower than silence. It allows blacked-out pages. It allows a waiver, but only with a public summary in its place. Silence isn't one of the options.

The threats are real, and so are the tools built to answer them. But trust in those tools rests on the public seeing the rules. A rule kept in a locked room isn't a rule you can hold anyone to.

The senators asked for answers by November 6. Congress returns after the election for its final weeks this year, and a defense bill is on its list. The court's approval of the program runs out in March. Will the ruling come out before any vote?

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John Braddock
Between the Lines
Stand tall. Stay disciplined.