The House of Representatives has passed a 45-day clean extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). In a 261-111 vote, the House passed the short-term extension after the Senate failed to approve a three-year extension. House Votes On Extending Controversial FISA Surveillance Program Axios shared further: House GOP leaders tacked on a ban on a central bank digital currency to win over conservative holdouts who had pushed for broader surveillance reforms. But that provision drew bipartisan opposition in the Senate, where lawmakers opted instead Thursday to pass the 45-day patch. Congress passed an initial short-term FISA extension earlier this month after a group of House Republicans blocked attempts to pass five-year and 18-month renewals of the program. The first short-term patch didn't turn out to be enough time to pass a full extension. Congressional leaders now have an additional 45 days to try to break the impasse. "Today Republicans and Democrats tried to use 'unanimous consent' to pass a 45-day extension of warrantless spying on Americans without voting," Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) said. "I did not consent. I was able to force a vote and a debate. I used a rare parliamentary procedure to control half the time," he added. Watch below: Today Republicans and Democrats tried to use “unanimous consent” to pass a 45-day extension of warrantless spying on Americans without voting. I did not consent. I was able to force a vote and a debate. I used a rare parliamentary procedure to control half the time. Watch here: pic.twitter.com/rP5njeHNLF — Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) April 30, 2026 FISA Section 702 empowers U.S. intelligence agencies to collect and review the electronic communications of foreign nationals located outside the United States without obtaining individual court orders. The provision has faced intense scrutiny for enabling the intelligence community to collect information on Americans without a warrant through its surveillance of foreigners. The Hill noted: While some have demanded that intelligence officers go to court to secure a probable cause warrant before querying the Section 702 database on Americans, the intelligence community and its allies in Congress have said they’d be unable to meet that standard, cutting off their ability to access critical information. In the House, Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) has pushed a proposal that would require intelligence agencies to go to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court before looking at information on Americans. But they’d only have to convince the court the search would be reasonably likely to return foreign intelligence information — a lower standard than probable cause.