An explosive new report reveals that the federal government secretly tracked billions of U.S. phone calls years before the 9/11 attacks. According to USA Today, the Justice Department and Drug Enforcement Administration collected bulk data for phone calls in as many as 116 countries deemed to have a connection with drug trafficking.

The program began in 1992 under President George H.W. Bush, nine years before his son, George W. Bush, authorized the National Security Agency to gather logs of Americans' phone calls in 2001. This program served as a blueprint for NSA mass surveillance.

"Democracy Now!" speaks with Brad Heath, the USA Today investigative reporter who broke the story.

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U.S. Began Bulk Collection of Phone Call Data in 1992