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ByEricTucker TheAssociatedPress WASHINGTON As Con- gress considers whether to extend the life of a pro- gram that sweeps up Amer- ican phone records, privacy advocates and civil liber- ties groups say too much about government surveil- lance remains secret for the public to fully evaluate its reach or effectiveness. The disclosure two years ago of the National Secu- rity Agency's surveillance efforts prodded the federal government to declassify reams of once-secret doc- uments, including opin- ions from a secretive intel- ligence court laying out the program's origins and legal underpinnings. But critics say key language from the disclosed documents re- mains censored, the re- lease of information has been selective, and the on- going trickle of once-secret memos has raised concerns about how many other po- tentially illuminating re- cords might yet remain outside the public's reach. "That means the public lacks information it needs to understand the signif- icance of the powers that government already has and the significance of the powers that the govern- ment is asking for," said Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union. The NSA program that collects and stores phone records is conducted under Section 215 of the USA Pa- triot Act. The extent of its reach remained secret un- til Edward Snowden, a for- mer NSA systems admin- istrator, disclosed details of the surveillance in 2013. Amid a public backlash, President Barack Obama has proposed that the NSA stop collecting the records in bulk and instead request them from phone compa- nies as needed for terror- ism investigations. Congress is now decid- ing whether to renew or modify the phone records collection when the law authorizing it expires in June. Senate Republicans this week introduced a bill to allow the NSA to con- tinue collecting the call- ing records of nearly ev- ery American, unveiling a measure that would bypass Senate committees and re- authorize sections of the Patriot Act. Intelligence officials say the program — which col- lects the "to" and "from" in- formation of most domes- tic landline phone calls but not their content — is crit- ical to detecting terrorist plots and have sought to justify it through the ongo- ing declassification of ma- terials, including from the Foreign Intelligence Sur- veillance Court. Among documents re- leased in the last two years are court opinions outlin- ing how the NSA was first authorized to start collect- ing bulk phone and Inter- net records in the hunt for al-Qaida terrorists, previ- ously classified testimony from intelligence officials and NSA analyst training materials. The disclosures far sur- pass available public in- formation on other secret programs such as targeted drone strikes against terror suspects. But there are gaps in the information that pri- vacy advocates say prevent the public from being able to fully judge the program's effectiveness, including the extent to which Section 215 has been construed to al- low for other types of bulk collection. "If the government is asking for the renewal of this authority, the public has a right to know at least in general terms how the authority is being used, and right now the public doesn't have that," Jaffer said. Last month, a federal judge in New York held in a public records lawsuit that the government could law- fully withhold any secret court ruling relating the use of Section 215 for bulk collection of records other than phone records. Judge William Pauley said the government had "offered a reasoned and persuasive argument for withholding" information that should not be second-guessed. In that same case, the Justice Department ear- lier released a couple dozen surveillance court rulings but refused to turn over unspecified others, the ex- act number of which it said was classified. The government contin- ues to pull back the cur- tain with periodic new dis- closures, such as the Justice Department's release in Jan- uary of a 5-year-old memo that said the Commerce Department was not obli- gated under Section 215 to turn over confidential cen- sus data to federal law en- forcement. But such disclo- sures, though welcomed by civil liberties groups, also hint at how much might still be unknown. The NSA program has also highlighted broader concerns about what pri- vacy advocates say is the government's overreliance on secretive court rulings and classified legal memos. CONGRESS Pr iv ac y ad vo ca te s see k mo re openness on NSA surveillance SUSANWALSH—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS President Barack Obama walks the Anahinga Trail at Everglades National Park, Florida, on Wednesday. By Josh Lederman The Associated Press EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK, FLA. Amid lurking alligators and the steamy heat of Florida's Everglades, President Barack Obama on Wednesday sounded the alarm about damage from climate change he said was already wreaking mayhem in Florida and across the United States. In an implicit rebuke to Florida's governor and other Republicans, Obama accused those who deny the man-made causes of climate change of sticking their heads in the sand. He said rising sea levels that have infused the Everglades with harmful salt water have already jeopardized Florida's drinking water and its $82 billion tourism industry. "You do not have time to deny the effects of climate change," Obama said, with the sprawling wetlands as his backdrop. Obama's quick visit to the South Florida land- mark, timed to coincide with Earth Day, marked his latest attempt to con- nect the dots between car- bon emissions and real-life implications. With his cli- mate change agenda un- der attack in Washington and courthouses across the U.S., Obama has been on a mission to force Amer- icans to envision a world in which cherished natu- ral wonders fall victim to pollution. So the president ditched his usual suit and tie Wednesday for a casual shirt and sunglasses as his helicopter touched down in Everglades Na- tional Park. A park ranger at his side, Obama walked the Anhinga Trail, west of Miami, where a series of wooden walkways took him through dense shrub- bery and over the slow-mov- ing river. Small alligators could be spotted swimming in the waters and shallow areas nearby, as a few large birds ducked in and out of the deep-green waters. The vast Everglades, known as the "River of Grass," fuel the region's tourism economy and wa- ter supply. Now roughly 1.4 million acres, the park com- prises most of what's left of a unique ecosystem that once stretched as far north as Orlando. Yet damage that started early in the 20th cen- tury, when people drained swamps to make room for homes and farms, has only grown more alarming as sea levels rise. Researchers fear by the time the water flow is fixed, the Everglades' native species could be lost to invasive plants and an- imals. "This is not a problem for another generation — not anymore," Obama said. "This is a problem now. It has serious implications for the way we live right now." Even so, the political overtones of Obama's visit were impossible to avoid. Two Florida Republi- cans gearing up presiden- tial campaigns for 2016 — Sen. Marco Rubio and for- mer Gov. Jeb Bush — have treaded carefully on the is- sue of climate change amid deep pockets of opposi- tion within the Republi- can Party. And GOP Gov. Rick Scott has attracted na- tional attention over his re- sistance to acknowledging man-made causes of cli- mate change head-on. Scott, ahead of Obama's visit, accused the presi- dent of cutting millions in his budget for repair of an aging dike around Lake Okeechobee, Florida's larg- est freshwater body. Al- though Obama didn't men- tion Scott by name, he of- fered a series of thinly veiled jabs over allegations his administration banned state employees from using the terms "climate change" and "global warming" — a claim Scott has denied. Obama warns about climate damage SOUTH FLORIDA LANDMARK PATRICK SEMANSKY — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE A sign stands outside the National Security Agency campus in Fort Meade, Maryland. By Erica Werner The Associated Press WASHINGTON The Sen- ate unanimously passed legislation Wednesday to help the victims of human trafficking, ending a tortu- ous partisan standoff over abortion that also delayed confirmation of President Barack Obama's attorney general nominee. The vote was 99-0 to ap- prove the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act, which expands law enforcement tools to target sex traffick- ers and creates a new fund to help victims. The House has passed similar legisla- tion and the White House has voiced support. "We have not fallen deaf to the cries of those who actually need our help, the victims of human traffick- ing," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, the lead GOP spon- sor. "This legislation will be instrumental in helping victims of sexual abuse and trafficking recover from a life in bondage." The unanimous outcome put a bipartisan punctua- tion mark on legislation that started out with wide support from both parties, but veered into a partisan cul-de-sac last month when Democrats said they'd no- ticed language that could expand federal prohibi- tions on abortion funding. How or why Democrats had failed to see the provision in the first place became a topic of frosty dispute on Capitol Hill, with Repub- licans pointing out that the bill had unanimously passed committee, and one Democratic senator's office acknowledging that an aide had in fact known of the abortion language. At the same time, Attor- ney General-designate Lo- retta Lynch languished de- spite commanding enough votes to be confirmed, be- cause Republican leaders made the decision, never fully explained, to delay her confirmation vote until the trafficking bill was com- pleted. Now that it is, Lynch will get a vote Thursday to replace Eric Holder and be- come the nation's first black female attorney general. The partisan gridlock on the trafficking bill and Lynch made no one look good, and with all sides eager for a resolution Cornyn worked with Sens. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada to arrive at a compromise, which they announced Tuesday. It ad- dresses Democratic con- cerns about expanding pro- hibitions on spending fed- eral funds for abortions, by splitting the new victims' fund into two pieces. One part of the fund would be made up of fines paid by sex traffickers, and it could not go for health services, rendering the abortion restrictions moot. The other part of the fund, which could go for medi- cal services, builds on $5 million already appropri- ated by Congress for Com- munity Health Centers, which are already subject to abortion spending pro- hibitions. The compro- mise allowed both sides to claim a win since Repub- licans ensured any money for health services could not go for abortions, while Democrats could say that they had prevented prohi- bitions on spending federal money for abortions from being expanded to a new source of money. UNANIMOUS VOTE An ti -h um an t ra ffic ki ng b il l pa ss es S en at e Confused About Hearing Aids? 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