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But as the process moves forward, the public is still learning more about some of the key details that were included in the bill. The New York Times reported, for example, on a provocative provision that GOP members tucked into the package.

A spending package expected to be approved as part of a deal to reopen the government would create a wide legal avenue for senators to sue for as much as half a million dollars each when federal investigators search their phone records without notifying them. The provision ... appears to immediately allow for eight G.O.P. senators to sue the government over their phone records being seized in the course of the investigation by Jack Smith, the former special counsel, into the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

The Times’ report added that this element, which is now likely to become law, would require federal investigators to notify senators about phone records searches, except in instances in which members are themselves a target of an investigation.

The provision “is retroactive to 2022,” the Times noted......

The New York Times reported in early October, “The analysis of phone toll records is a common investigative tactic. ... Such toll record information does not include the contents of conversations, which would require a court-approved wiretap.”

A related analysis from CNN explained that there was nothing especially surprising about any of this.

We already knew that the phone records of some lawmakers were seized in Smith’s probe, because the Justice Department had to overcome legal hurdles posed by the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause. And it’s difficult to understand how Smith ever could have conducted such a probe without obtaining some phone records of lawmakers. That’s because Trump’s pressure on lawmakers was a key part of his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. ... It would seem very difficult to piece together a case without understanding who was talking to whom, and when.

MSNBC’s Ken Dilanian emphasized a related point, noting that the former special counsel’s final report, released earlier this year, made note of these same toll records.