House unanimously votes to scrap measure that could give senators up to $500K for being spied on

WASHINGTON — House lawmakers unanimously moved Wednesday to claw back a provision tucked into the stopgap bill to end the government shutdown last week that would enable spied-on senators to sue the government for up to $500,000.

The lower chamber voted 426-0 to scrap the provision House GOP lawmakers claimed they had been jammed with by their Senate peers last week during the rush to reopen the government.

“Not only was it disrespectful to Speaker Johnson and House Republicans to slip the Senate’s $500,000 payout into a funding bill at the last minute, but now Leader Thune is mocking House Republicans and doubling down,” Rep. John Rose (R-Tenn.) said.

“[Thune] is playing House Republicans for fools.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) defended the provision in an interview with CNN, but has been coy about whether the upper chamber will vote on the House’s bill to nix the controversial perk for senators.

“The House is going to do what they’re going to do with it. It didn’t apply to them,” Thune told CNN Tuesday.

“I don’t think anybody was talking about taking the money,” he continued, “but I think the penalty is in place to ensure that in the future … there is a remedy in place.”

Last month, it was revealed that the FBI’s Arctic Frost probe, which was later taken over by former special counsel Jack Smith, had obtained phone records of 10 sitting GOP lawmakers, including nine senators.

The records included metadata showing which calls were made and received by those lawmakers, not the content of the actual calls.

Under the controversial provision tucked into the stopgap bill to reopen the government, senators can sue the government and claim up to $500,000 in damages, plus attorneys’ fees, per each instance when their call logs were forked over to the feds.

Critically, the provision was retroactive to 2022, which cleared the way for the GOP senators to pursue up to $500,000 settlement per instance their phone’s metadata was turned over.

That provision also requires phone carriers to notify senators if their accounts, records or communications are pursued. If a lawmaker is subject to a criminal investigation, a judge can issue a 60-day nondisclosure order.

Lawmakers targeted included Sens. Bill Hagerty of Tennessee; Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming; Dan Sullivan of Alaska; Josh Hawley of Missouri; Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Tommy Tuberville of Alabama; and Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania, per documents released by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).

Graham has publicly indicated that he intends to sue the federal government for damages.

“I think this was worse than Watergate, an effort to destroy President Trump, charge him with crimes that are just ridiculous, and come after people like me,” Graham told Fox News’ Sean Hannity Tuesday.

“I’m not going to put up with this crap anymore. I’m going to sue.”