Mitch McConnell walks from the Senate Chamber after gaveling open a special session. Senate fails to save PATRIOT Act Key provisions have expired – at least for a few days.

Key parts of the PATRIOT Act expired at midnight after a bitterly divided Senate adjourned after failing to reach agreement during a rare Sunday session to extend the anti-terrorism law.

The Senate did vote overwhelmingly to advance the USA Freedom Act, a House-passed surveillance reform bill that GOP leaders opposed but were forced to accept given the lack of time and other alternatives. But Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) refused to allow that measure to be adopted in time to replace the expiring PATRIOT Act provisions.


The USA Freedom Act easily cleared a filibuster in a 77-17 vote that appeared to set the stage for eventual passage. But it was not the outcome envisioned by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: He had hoped to pass a temporary extension of current law to avoid a midnight shutdown of three PATRIOT Act programs, including the controversial “bulk data” phone record collection program.

But Paul wouldn’t relent, so those initiatives have at least temporarily lapsed, a troubling development for Senate Republicans in just their fifth month in the majority.

“All of us are extremely concerned about the program going dark at a time when the terrorist threat is very high,” said Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine).

The Senate will vote next to end debate Tuesday on the House bill and on amendments intended to make it more palatable to Senate hawks. Those will likely extend a transition period to the new bill beyond six months and require additional certifications to the reformed data collection program.

Until then, three surveillance authorities will be nullified. And the House will still have to reconcile with the Senate over any changes later this week.

McConnell has already submitted a set of amendments to the measure. One relatively uncontroversial proposal, submitted with Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.), would require telecommunications companies to notify the government if they plan to hold onto call records for less than 18 months. Another would to require the director of national intelligence to certify that the new process for obtaining business records effectively protects national security.

But other amendments may face significant resistance in the Senate and House, including a provision that would give the NSA six more months to wind down its bulk phone records collection program, and another that would gut the bill’s effort to make public any significant opinions from the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

All four are slated to get a vote after the Senate votes to end debate Tuesday, leaving the bill for now on the doorstep of success but not a done deal, even as Washington clamors for a swift resolution.

“We call on the Senate to ensure this irresponsible lapse in authorities is as short-lived as possible,” said White House press secretary Josh Earnest. “Individual senators must put aside their partisan motivations and act swiftly.”

Paul seemed unconcerned: Through his presidential campaign, he said his successful, if temporary, victory “will not relinquish functions necessary for protecting national security.”

A visibly angry McConnell made a last-ditch attempt to keep the expiring provisions on life support on Sunday evening. He moved to extend for two weeks less controversial wire-tapping and “lone wolf” terrorist provisions, only to be rebuffed by his Kentucky colleague. Responding on the Senate floor, McConnell ripped what he called “demagoguery” surrounding the PATRIOT Act debate.

Though McConnell had pressed Republicans to oppose the House bill earlier last month, he said the alternative — letting the PATRIOT Act provisions expire — “would mean disarming completely and arbitrarily, based on a campaign of disinformation.”

“It’s a totally unacceptable outcome. We won’t be doing that,” McConnell said, staring at Paul at times during the stern speech, which was interrupted by Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts’ “Frozen” phone ringtone. “We’re left with Option 2, the House-passed bill. It’s not ideal but, along with votes on some modest amendments that attempt to ensure the program can actually work as promised, it’s now the only realistic way forward.”

After the vote, Paul took to the floor to criticize the House bill, which would extend the PATRIOT Act but make major changes to bulk data programs exposed by Edward Snowden. Paul acknowledged that the bill will eventually pass despite his opposition even as he asserted that “the PATRIOT Act will expire tonight.”

“It concerns me that the president [who] supports bulk data collection and has been performing it illegally for six years is supporting this bill,” Paul said. “It’s hard for me to have trust in the people we are giving great power to.”

McConnell laid out out his strategy during a closed-door Republican meeting on Sunday afternoon. He indicated he would try to fix what he believes are problems with the House bill, which would make telecom companies responsible for bulk data collection.

Paul was not present at the party meeting, and it was clear his colleagues were tiring of the presidential candidate’s campaign against swift passage of any surveillance legislation. Before he objected to McConnell’s last-ditch effort, Paul was shouted down by his fellow Republicans as he attempted to give another speech against government surveillance.

And McConnell lashed the “determined opposition from those who simply wish to end this counterterrorism program altogether” — a clear reference to Paul, the leader of that opposition.

“It’s worrying for our country. Because the nature of the threat we face is serious, it’s aggressive, it’s sophisticated, it’s geographically dispersed, and it’s not going away,” McConnell said.

Sources said the USA Freedom Act, with or without amendments, could be approved as early as Tuesday or Wednesday even if Paul continues his fight. But McConnell had vowed not to let the programs lapse, hoping that the June 1 deadline would pressure the Senate to act as he pushed trade legislation through the Senate first.

In reaction to McConnell’s quandary, Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) blasted his successor’s leadership of the Senate, including his decision to wait to take up the PATRIOT Act until just before its key provisions were set to expire.

“The job of the leader is to have a plan. In this case, it is clear the majority leader simply didn’t have a plan,” Reid said on the Senate floor. “The majority leader, though, had five months during the time he’s been majority leader to coordinate with the House, which passed (surveillance) reform weeks ago, but instead he went it alone. In fact, it appears as if the House and the Senate Republican leaders are on completely different pages.”

Indeed, Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who shepherded a surveillance reform bill through the House by an overwhelming margin earlier this month, urged McConnell to take up the USA Freedom Act on Sunday night.

Burr, the Intelligence Committee chairman and an ally of McConnell, predicted the House bill would pass but “not in its current form.”

Tempers flared as the debate unfolded. Senators were called back to Washington early from their Memorial Day vacation to address the issue, and most of their ire was directed at Paul.

“The way we work in the Senate, at least we used to, is we have compromises. And compromises may have to be made,” said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) of McConnell’s change of position on the House bill. “That is not Sen. Paul’s M.O.”

Paul has been asking McConnell to allow him to have two votes on his privacy amendments, including one that would kill bulk data collection altogether, at simple majority thresholds rather than at a 60-vote threshold. It’s a demand most senators will not agree to. Reid said Democrats “would agree to take” up the amendments Paul had demanded before the Memorial Day recess, assuming they are “limited to two.” Reid said he and Paul did not discuss Paul’s demands that they be considered on a 51-vote threshold.

But it appeared that Republicans were more focused on amending the House-passed bill than trying to placate Paul at this point. They are concerned that the phone companies will shirk the bulk data collection program prescribed by the bill and want a longer transition period to the new setup than the six-month period that the House bill affords.

“There’ll be some amendments to strengthen the House bill and hopefully we’ll get that passed before the week’s out,” said Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas). The amendments, he added, “make a lot of sense.”

The Obama administration has warned repeatedly of serious national security risks if the PATRIOT Act provisions expired. Officials said that process began happening at 8 p.m. Sunday as the Senate sputtered in trying to find agreement.

If the Senate passes anything other than the USA Freedom Act, the House will have to greenlight it as well. House lawmakers return to Washington on Monday evening and will have to decide if any changes made by McConnell are acceptable.

Alex Byers and Seung Min Kim contributed to this report.