The House may vote this week on the...

The House may vote this week on the USA Freedom Act, HR-3361, said Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., laying out the weekly vote schedule. The Rules Committee posted the latest version of the bill Tuesday (http://1.usa.gov/1gLP4BP), which privacy advocates now say may be watered down. The USA Freedom Act was introduced last fall with the intention of ending the government’s bulk collection of phone metadata, and recently cleared the House Judiciary and Intelligence committees. The Rules Committee brought up the bill Tuesday in conjunction with considering amendments for HR-4435, the National Defense Authorization Act, also slated for a possible vote this week. Rep. Justin Amash, R-Mich., is seeking to amend HR-4435 to stop government surveillance activities in a separate maneuver, amid fears that the USA Freedom Act may be watered down. “The Amash Amendment to the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act (#NDAA) is materially identical to language in the #USAFREEDOMAct that unanimously passed both the House Committee on the Judiciary and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence two weeks ago,” Amash wrote on Facebook. “I will be monitoring progress on the Freedom Act, and I hope that my amendment will be unnecessary."