Opposition to Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) is bipartisan. The ACLU, Electronic Frontier Foundation and Brennan Center for Justice are all vehement critics that have called for reforms for years. Most of their concerns dovetail with the far-right House Freedom Caucus and many other conservatives. Most critics agree that the stated purpose of the Section, which is to collect vital national security intelligence from non-Americans located outside the United States, is fully justified. But, because the Section focuses on non-Americans, no warrant is needed to compel internet companies to turn over electronic communications on the targets, and this inevitably sweeps up communications to and from American citizens. Unfortunately, this information has historically been used in court or to further investigations against American citizens when it would otherwise have been considered a violation of people’s Fourth Amendment rights. Even when this information isn’t used in legal proceedings it presents a privacy violation because the FBI and other government agencies can access it with loose restrictions.

Section 702 was most recently reauthorized for two years in 2024, but without reforms sought by its critics, particularly on creating a warrant requirement. This deeply angered members of the House Freedom Caucus who blamed House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Turner of Ohio for aggressively pushing the reauthorization through. This is one reason why the Caucus pushed for Turner to be replaced. And that’s precisely what happened on Wednesday night when Speaker Mike Johnson called Turner into his office and told him he was losing the gavel.  According to Turner, Johnson told him that the change was due to “concerns from Mar-a-Lago,” although Johnson denies this. As to why the Trump administration might be angry with Turner over Section 702, that’s a little less clear.

Trump signed a reauthorization of the Section in 2018, despite his evidence-free suspicions that it had been used to spy on his 2016 campaign. He has since joined the critics and asked Republicans to vote against its reauthorization in 2024. One reason the last reauthorization was for two years instead of six was to give the incoming Trump administration the ability to push for amendments. But we’re already seeing some splits in their ranks. During his confirmation hearing to lead the CIA, former DIA director John Ratcliffe strongly endorsed Section 702 in its present form, although he allowed that it should be reviewed. That put him at odds with Trump’s nominee to head the FBI, Kash Patel, and possibly also with Tulsi Gabbard who he has tapped to head the DIA. Gabbard has long been a critic of the Section and voted against its reauthorization, although she changed her tune in the lead-up to her own confirmation hearing.

Another reason Mar-a-Lago and the Freedom Caucus may have forced Turner out is that he’s been a big supporter of NATO and aid to Ukraine. Johnson’s choice of replacement, Rep, Rick Crawford of Arkansas, voted against funding for Ukraine in April 2024, saying, “I cannot in good faith vote to send billions of dollars in non-military financial aid to Ukraine to prop up its economy when Americans are struggling with rising costs at home.” His justified this by arguing that the aid package wasn’t narrowly tailored on military aid, but that may have just been a convenient excuse. In any case, it presents a strong distinction from Turner who argued last year that Russian propaganda has infected a significant sector of his own party.

A final consideration in this change is that Turner voted to certify Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s 2020 victory, while Crawford did not. That’s a slight Trump is not likely to have forgotten.

The most visible manifestation of discontent with Turner came in a Tablet Magazine article from Lee Smith published on January 8, 2025 called The Deep State Strikes Back. While the piece was primarily written to oppose the appointment of Adam Howard to serve as the National Security Council’s senior director for intelligence, Howard was a staffer for Turner on the House Intelligence Committee. The article accused Turner and Howard of impeding any investigations “that might have embarrassed Biden administration intelligence officials.” It also alleged that Turner had been overheard saying that he’s “taking over Trump’s IC [Intelligence Community],” presumably using Howard’s position at the NSC as his instrument. Perhaps these accusations were enough to convince Trump to press Johnson to replace Turner with Crawford.

Appointments to the House Intelligence Committee are made by the Speaker, and Johnson began making it Trumpier last year with the appointments of notorious Reps. Ronny Jackson and Scott Perry. He completed the job this week by following up the defenestration of chairman Turner with the assignment of Reps. Ben Cline (Va.), Pat Fallon (Texas), Greg Steube (Fla.), Claudia Tenney (N.Y.) and Ann Wagner (Mo.) to the panel. Of these new members, including Jackson and Perry, only Wagner voted for the April 2024 Ukraine aid package.

When I consider the totality of the evidence here, it definitely does appear that Johnson is helping Trump purge supporters of Ukraine from the Intelligence Committee. This is despite Johnson flip-flopping from his prior opposition to become a supporter of Ukrainian aid after his ascension to the Speaker’s chair.

This is probably not the only motive, but it’s a significant one. Writing for The Dispatch, Nick Catoggio has more concerns:

It’s unthinkable that a Republican House would ever move to impeach Trump, no matter how corruptly he behaved. But I can imagine a Turner-led intel committee asking tough questions about Tulsi Gabbard’s sympathies as director of national intelligence, say, or Kash Patel’s “enemies list” at the FBI. Or even demanding answers the next time Trump’s scummier deputies resolve to engage in a “drug deal” abroad on his behalf.

Ousting Turner as chairman isn’t a simple matter of facilitating Trump’s foreign policy agenda, in other words. It’s a matter of sidelining a rare Republican who’s demonstrated greater loyalty to his ideology than to his party’s leader—“retribution,” one might call it—and who might therefore insist on meaningful oversight of the new administration to force it to keep its nose clean. A presidency that was born unaccountable will naturally abhor having the House’s “deep state” committee led by someone who might demand accountability.

It’s worth noting that the replacement of Turner is controversial among House Republicans and deeply unpopular with some. Even many Democrats have spoken out in defense of Turner, including Intelligence Committee ranking member Chris Himes of Connecticut who said the decision “sends a shiver down my spine,” and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries who said Turner’s “shameful“and “unjustified ouster is likely being applauded by our adversaries in Russia and China.”

I do not believe Johnson’s claim that the decision was his own. It came from Trump and it came for nefarious reasons. I’m not a supporter of backdoor warrantless surveillance of American citizens, and it’s highly unlikely that Turner would have provided meaningful oversight of the administration or that he’d have been a significant check on Trump’s foreign policy or coming crimes. But he was cleared out to make sure. It’s part of a broader plan to make sure no one in the intelligence community can stand up to or expose what’s coming.