Former House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte Urges DOJ to Suspend U.S.–UK Data Deal

General Warrants Are Back – This Time in Digital Form

Former U.S. Congressman from Virginia and Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Bob Goodlatte.

​If you’ve read Rick Atkinson’s prize-winning books on the American Revolution or watched Ken Burns’ documentaries on that founding event, you know how deeply Americans have always valued privacy. The Revolution itself was sparked, in part, by outrage over the British Crown’s use of “general warrants” – sweeping authorities that allowed the King’s agents to ransack homes, warehouses, offices, and ships at dock in search of anything they deemed suspicious.

Now, nearly 250 years after the Declaration of Independence, London is at it again.

This time, the British government is executing a plan to override the security and encryption protections built into U.S. technology products – exposing the private data of Americans, and potentially users around the world, beginning with Apple devices.

The CLOUD Act — and a Deal Gone Wrong

PPSA Senior Policy Advisor Bob Goodlatte knows this territory well. A former congressman from Virginia and Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Goodlatte helped lead passage in 2018 of the Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act, better known as the CLOUD Act.

The CLOUD Act allows the United States and trusted foreign partners to enter into data-sharing agreements, enabling law enforcement to seek data through warrants or subpoenas regardless of where that data is stored. But Congress paired this authority with firm guardrails to protect privacy, civil liberties, and the rule of law.

One of those agreements – the U.S.–UK Data Access Agreement (DAA) – has now veered sharply off course.

“I am deeply troubled by how the United Kingdom has taken advantage of our goodwill,” Goodlatte wrote in a letter sent late last week to Attorney General Pam Bondi.

Britain’s Abuse of Surveillance Powers

At issue is the UK’s use of so-called Technical Capabilities Notices, or TCNs, issued under the UK Investigatory Powers Act. These secret orders can compel U.S. technology companies to weaken, delay, or suspend the deployment of essential security features, including end-to-end encryption.

“The threat to Americans’ privacy from these measures is real,” Goodlatte warned, whether the UK’s actions affect U.S. companies’ global products or are limited to services offered in Britain. Even in the latter case, he explained, the consequences are profound: increased risk of global surveillance, compromised digital infrastructure, and a direct assault on the protections Congress demanded when it approved the agreement.

Approval Rights and Gag Orders on U.S. Companies

Goodlatte also pointed to a particularly alarming requirement: U.S. companies must notify the British government before rolling out security upgrades – precisely the kind of foreign leverage Congress explicitly sought to prevent.

The CLOUD Act’s promise of streamlined cross-border cooperation, he wrote, “was never intended by Congress to be leveraged by a foreign partner to compel any form of ‘backdoor’ access or other types of decryption assistance.”

Even worse, UK policy reportedly imposes gag orders that prevent U.S. companies, starting with Apple, from disclosing this interference even to the U.S. government itself.

The Only Remedy: Suspend the Agreement

The CLOUD Act anticipated this scenario. Under the DAA, the United States may suspend or terminate the agreement when a partner government’s laws or practices materially undermine its privacy and civil liberties commitments.

“Accordingly,” Goodlatte wrote, “I urge the Department of Justice to invoke Article 12.3 and suspend the Agreement unless and until the UK withdraws its use of TCNs.”

During passage of the CLOUD Act, Goodlatte insisted on strong congressional oversight of the law’s implementation. Now, he is calling on the Justice Department to enforce the deal’s terms – and protect Americans from a digital revival of the general warrants our founders fought to abolish.
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Expect sitting Members of Congress to take up that call as well.

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