Nearly two years after NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden first revealed the U.S. government was secretly operating mass surveillance programs against the American public, including bulk collection of telephone data, privacy advocates and civil libertarians are celebrating—at least temporarily—after the U.S. Senate on Sunday failed to extend authorities for key portions of those programs before a midnight deadline.

As the Associated Press reports:

A coalition formed by anti-surveillance organizations CREDO, Fight for the Future, and Demand Progress welcomed the “sunsetting” of the provisions, even as they warned against the possibility of Congress re-authorizing some of the same programs as soon as this week. In a joint statement, the groups said:

“The overwhelming majority of Americans who don’t want to be indiscriminately spied on by their very own government have brought their will to bear in this fight – and have upended the inside-the-Beltway conventional wisdom that said a sunset was impossible,” said David Segal, executive director of Demand Progress. “The fiercely contested battle over the PATRIOT Act and its temporary sunset demonstrate the growing power of the mass movement to reform America’s out-of-control surveillance agencies. With the expiration of Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act, each senator must now go on record and publicly decide whether to protect our civil liberties or codify unconstitutional government spying all over again through the USA FREEDOM Act.”

“Sunsetting the Patriot Act is the biggest win for ending mass surveillance programs, and one that conventional DC wisdom said was impossible. We are seeing history in the making and it was because the public stood up for our rights to freedom of expression and freedom of association – and there’s no turning back now,” said Tiffiniy Cheng, co-founder of Fight for the Future.

Meanwhile, the ACLU’s Michael Macleod-Ball, acting director of its Washington Legislative Office, said the NSA’s reliance on Section 215 to maintain the bulk collection of telephone data, which a federal court last month found to be unconstitutional, should be permanently ended and the Senate should take this new opportunity to take up truly meaningful reform legislation, not a “weak bill” like the USA FREEDOM Act.
Click Here: Putters “Sunday’s vote, at least a temporary sunset, and the debate of the last few weeks are a reflection of strong support — across the political spectrum — for meaningful and comprehensive reform of the surveillance laws,” Macleod-Ball said.

As the New York Times reports:

According to the Huffington Post, a vote on the House version of the USA FREEDOM Act could come this week: