The House of Representatives tabled on Wednesday legislation to reform U.S. surveillance law. The two-month delay puts off a collision with a competing Senate version.

The move automatically extends provisions of the Patriot Act that would otherwise expire at year's end. The Senate is likewise expected to delay the matter.

The act, hastily adopted six weeks after the 2001 terror attacks, greatly expanded the government’s ability to spy on Americans in the name of national security.

A key difference between the House and Senate packages concerns the standard by which the FBI may issue so-called National Security Letters – although Wednesday's vote prolongs the time for more backroom negotiations. Reforming NSL powers is a key bone of contention in the Patriot Act debate, even though it is not one of the three Patriot Act provisions that was scheduled to expire Dec. 31.

NSLs allow the FBI, without a court order, to obtain telecommunication, financial and credit records relevant to a government investigation. The FBI issues about 50,000 NSLs annually, and an internal watchdog has found repeated abuses of the NSL powers.

A House version permits NSLs in cases concerning terrorism or spy activities of an agent of a foreign power. If it became law, such a plan would vastly reduce whom the government could target. The Senate version generally would leave NSLs under the status quo.

Under Wednesday's action, the NSL-reform vote is also delayed until the New Year. And the three expiring provisions will remain in force at least through February. The extension came as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) balked at a Senate plan to include Patriot Act amendments into a $636 billion Pentagon funding measure, saying doing so would create "revolt on the left."

One of the Patriot Act provisions that was set to expire concerns the FBI obtaining wiretaps from a secret court — known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court or FISA court — without having to identify the target or what method of communication is to be tapped.

Another provision in question is the so-called "lone wolf" measure that allows FISA court warrants for the electronic monitoring of a person for whatever reason — even without showing that the suspect is an agent of a foreign power or a terrorist. The government has said it has never invoked that provision, but that it wants to retain the authority to do so.

The third and final provision concerns one of the more controversial provisions of the Patriot Act — Section 215. The section allows the secret FISA court to authorize broad warrants for most any type of record, including those held by banks, libraries and doctors without requiring the government to show a connection between the items sought under a Section 215 warrant and a suspected terrorist or spy.

A Senate version and a House version require such a connection when it comes to library records.

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