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U.S. Sen. Rand Paul says hes still fighting against bulk data collection by the National Security Agency despite voting this week against moving forward with a bill meant to help reform such practices.

In an interview with the Daily News on Wednesday a day after casting his vote the Kentucky Republican from Bowling Green said hehas been one of the loudest voices on Capitol Hill speaking out against the NSAs mass collection and storage of telephone metadata.Metadata include telephone numbers that make and receive calls and the time and date of a call.

Im also an opponent of the Patriot Act, which allowed a lot of this to happen, he said.

Paul said that while the NSA reform bill sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., would have done some good things, it would also have reauthorized some provisions of the Patriot Act through 2017. That act, Paul notes, is what allowed such collection of information to happen in the first place.

It was one of those situations where youre torn, he said.

Pauls vote against moving forward with the bill put him on the same side as Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., but for opposite reasons.

McConnell has expressed concern that the bill could hurt the fight against terrorism.

This is the worst possible time to be tying our hands behind our backs, McConnell was quoted by the New York Times as saying before Tuesdays vote.

Despite that opposition, Paul said McConnell will allow legislative amendments in the Senate when he takes over as majority leader. Those amendments could help move toward reforms of the NSA.

Coming up in the next Congress, Senator McConnell has promised an open amendment process, Paul said.

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Paul talks NSA data collection, Patriot Act