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Leahy ‘deeply disturbed’ by new Gonzales allegations |
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By Kara Oppenheim
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Posted: 07/10/07 03:17 PM [ET] |
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Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) said Tuesday he found reports “deeply disturbing” that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales misled Congress in an April hearing regarding the timing of his knowledge of civil liberties abuses by the FBI. “Unfortunately, this administration’s penchant for secrecy makes it difficult to work in a cooperative way, and it is only through dogged oversight or Freedom of Information Act lawsuits — such as the one that revealed these inconsistent statements — that Congress and the American people learn the truth about this administration’s activities,” said Leahy, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee. In response to follow-up questions from an April oversight hearing on the topic, the Department of Justice indicated to Leahy that Gonzales first learned of abuses by the FBI of National Security Letters (NSLs) through drafts of the Office of Inspector General’s report on NSL abuses, just before the report was publicly released in March. The Washington Post reported today, however, that prior to Gonzales’s statements in support of renewing the Patriot Act in 2005, when he assured the Senate Intelligence Committee that “there has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse,” the FBI had already sent reports to his office describing privacy violations and abuse of NSLs. “This inconsistency is a disturbing addition to a growing list of misleading answers by the attorney general to questions from the Judiciary Committee, and it is unacceptable,” Leahy announced. “I intend to pursue this matter with the attorney general prior to his appearance before the Judiciary Committee later this month.” |
