|
Spy chief courts Blue Dogs for FISA law overhaul |
|
By Susan Crabtree
|
|
Posted: 08/02/07 07:14 PM [ET] |
Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Michael McConnell has quietly courted key members of the House Blue Dog Coalition for a short-term fix for the administration’s foreign-intelligence surveillance program, putting additional
pressure on Democratic leaders to pass a bill before the end of the week.
Republicans have recently hammered Democrats for failing to pass promptly an emergency overhaul of the law governing electronic surveillance. Republicans have cited new evidence that terrorists are planning attacks on domestic soil, although the administration has not raised the terrorist threat alert level recently.
It was also a hot topic of discussion when congressional leaders met with President Bush at the White House Wednesday morning. McConnell held another meeting with House members Wednesday afternoon. Republicans and the White House argue that they need the overhaul immediately so they can fix a problem in the law that in some cases prevents warrantless surveillance of foreign suspects talking to other foreigners overseas.
The GOP criticism didn’t stop after Democrats announced in the afternoon that they hoped to get a bill to President Bush’s desk before the August recess.
But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) stopped short of scheduling a vote on the measure in the two remaining legislative days on the calendar.
“We hope that we’ll be able to have that legislation done quickly,” Reid said. “It’s not a certainty, but we will do all we can.”
McConnell’s office, however, started reaching out to Blue Dogs before negotiations intensified in an attempt to help leverage the Democratic Caucus. Rep. Bud Cramer (D-Ala.), a member of the Intelligence Committee, said over the weekend McConnell asked him to organize a Blue Dog meeting, which was held on Tuesday in a secure location. The DNI’s office also reached out to Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.), the former ranking member of the Intelligence panel who now chairs the intelligence subcommittee on the Homeland Security Committee. Pelosi denied her the top spot on Intelligence last winter.
Harman said that she has been privy to information about the increased terrorist “chatter” and believes there’s a real risk that terrorists could strike in this country in August, and that an overhaul of the bill could help the NSA deter it.
“The two of us became lead dogs on this,” Cramer said.
On Wednesday, 33 of 47 Blue Dogs signed a letter to McConnell expressing their desire to pass an overhaul before the end of the week.
“We share your concern about the need for surveilling all foreign-to-foreign communications involving suspected terrorists, and believe Congress should act before we recess to clarify your authority to do this. ... We intend to communicate our views promptly to House leadership,” they wrote.
Cramer said the letter was not an official Blue Dog position because there was no vote held within the coalition. He said he believed more than 33 Blue Dogs would support the stance once they were aware of it, but thought it was important to put the letter out quickly “to create pressure on both sides that we do need a temporary fix.”
Meanwhile, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) announced details of the Democrats’ proposal Wednesday afternoon. House Intelligence Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas) said the framework for a deal had been completed the night before in a meeting between Democratic and GOP negotiators and DNI McConnell.
But Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) stressed that the sticking points remains over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which historically has been the sole authority for warrants for domestic foreign-intelligence gathering. He said Democrats want to ensure that the court remains involved in reviewing communications intercepts so that authority for approving wiretap and surveillance requests is not handed to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, as the administration would like.
“I believe we should make this targeted and responsible fix now,” said Leahy in a statement Wednesday. “[But] it is not wise to expand the authority of this Attorney General — or any Attorney General — in this regard. I urge the Administration to support this reasonable solution that ensures checks and balances while strengthening our national security.”
Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.), ranking member on the House Intelligence panel, said the two sides remain far apart on key points. He said that Republicans and the White House want to be able to bypass the court in certain cases and that the two sides also differ on whether the surveillance should be limited to members of recognized terrorist organizations or whether surveillance could extend to suspect citizens of countries such as Syria and North Korea. He added that Democrats also want to add “bureaucratic reporting requirements.”
Reyes rejected Hoekstra’s characterizations of the negotiations, saying that Democrats had signed off on McConnell’s desire to collect information from people who are not members of recognized terrorist organizations, and that the two sides were just working out minor differences.
He also noted that Democrats are “committed” to passing the overhaul before the August recess.
|
