Reid: Congress Should Stay Until Spy Bill Passes
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A bill backed by President Bush to overhaul American spy agencies faced an uncertain future on Sunday and a top Democrat said the Republican-led Congress should not adjourn for the year until it passes.
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(InfoWorld) - A U.S. House of Representatives Committee has approved a controversial bill that would broaden the U.S. government's ability to conduct electronic surveillance on U.S. residents by making it easier for federal law enforcement officials to get court-issued warrants. The Electronic Modernization Surveillance Act,Â opposed by several privacy groups, would also allow federal law enforcement officials to spy on U.S. residents for up to 90 days without a court order in the period after a terrorist attack. The House Judiciary Committee approved the legislation Wednesday by a 20-16 vote, with all committee Democrats present voting against the bill. The bill, sponsored by Representative Heather Wilson, a New Mexico Republican, would reduce the amount of information required from federal agents applying for a wiretapping warrant from the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The bill would clarify that the U.S. government can seek wiretaps on any type of electronic communication, not just telephone- or radio-spectrum-based communication. Republicans praised the bill, saying it will help the U.S. government fight terrorism. The bill will provide the U.S. intelligence agencies "greater agility and flexibility as they try to thwart our determined and dangerous terrorist enemies," Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, a Wisconsin Republican, said in a statement. The full House is expected to vote on the bill by the end of the month. The committee's action comes after U.S. President George Bush called on Congress to approve a controversial electronic surveillance program conducted by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). The NSA has conducted the program, reportedly targeting U.S. residents speaking with foreigners who have suspected terrorism connections, without getting court warrants. Bush has asked Congress to authorize the NSA program to ward off multiple court challenges against it. In August, a U.S. judge in Michigan ruled the NSA program is illegal and must be halted. The Bush administration has appealed that ruling. The Senate Judiciary CommitteeÂ approved three surveillance billsÂ last week. The Center for Democracy and Technology, a privacy and civil liberties advocacy group, called the Wilson bill and the Senate's National Security Surveillance Act two of the worst bills now in Congress. "Couched in the seemingly laudable terms of 'modernization,' the bills would radically undermine the privacy of innocent Americans -- not just by legitimizing the administration's warrantless surveillance programs -- but by granting this and future administrations even broader authority to spy on Americans in the United States without judicial review," the CDT said on its Web site.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S. Congress should proceed cautiously while considering bills to authorize a U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance program because of the potential impact on the technology industry, a tech trade group said Friday. A day after legislation to authorize the controversial NSA program stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) sent a letter to the committee raising concerns about surveillance programs that "undermine" government checks and balances in the U.S. Constitution. A massive surveillance program will hurt users' confidence in the privacy of communications networks and will put burdensome requirements on tech and telecom vendors, said Ed Black, president and chief executive officer of CCIA. The trade group's members include Google Inc., Yahoo Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. "This is a very delicate area, and we have to be careful of what we do," Black said. "What the [Bush] administration has been pushing is a system without real limits, without real checks." U.S. President George Bush's administration has used the NSA program to monitor electronic communications of U.S. residents, without seeking court-issued wiretap orders. Bush, in a speech on Thursday, defended the program and said it helps keep U.S. residents safe. Although Bush administration officials continue to say the program is legal, Bush called on Congress to authorize the program as a way to head off multiple lawsuits challenging it. "The terrorists who want to harm America can now buy disposable cell phones, and open anonymous e-mail addresses," Bush said during a speech in Atlanta, Georgia. "Our laws need to change to take these changes into account." In August, a federal judge in Michigan declared the NSA program illegal, and in July, a federal judge in California, denied motions by the U.S. government and AT&T Inc. to stop a lawsuit over the carrier's alleged participation in the NSA program. On Thursday, a federal judge in Oregon rejected a motion by the U.S. government to stop a lawsuit there alleging the NSA program is illegal. An Islamic organization brought the lawsuit against Bush and directors of the NSA and Federal Bureau of Investigation. Also on Thursday, two bills to authorize the NSA program stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee when Democrats offered a series of amendments. Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, complained that Democrats were obstructing the legislation. Specter may try to bring the legislation up for a vote in the Judiciary Committee later this month. Black urged the committee to fully consider the economic effects of a large surveillance program. Telecom carriers and Internet service providers may have to store records of all communications for several months if the legislation is approved, he said. "We're running headlong into a major alteration of the way communications in this country are monitored without a thorough consideration of all the factors in play," Black said.
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2.007 was not exactly a barn-burner on Capitol Hill. It was notable mostly for its record number of delaying tactics in the Senate, which helped stymie almost every attempt at major legislation.
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Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Congress may try before the end of the year to revive a bill to overhaul the nation&#39;s intelligence services that was stalled by objections from Republicans in the US House.
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Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid questioned President Bush's honesty on Tuesday and said he wanted "the boys at the White House" to know he wasn't losing any sleep over the Republican Party labeling him an obstructionist.
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Congress&#39;s chief opponent of legislation to revamp the intelligence community says he remains unmoved, leaving the White House scrambling this weekend for a solution to the impasse that
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A long-delayed bill overhauling the nation's intelligence agencies is nearing passage now that President Bush and House Armed Services chairman Duncan Hunter have endorsed a compromise guaranteeing battlefield commanders access to top-secret information.
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Senate Majority Leader-elect Harry Reid said Tuesday he's doing away with the "do-nothing Congress" that Democrats campaigned against and plans to keep senators working long hours &#151; focusing first on ethics, the minimum wage and stem cell research.
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Congress was pushing on Friday to finish legislation that would boost security at U.S. ports, but the bill was attracting a flurry of last-minute amendments with both parties viewing it as a must-pass measure ahead of November elections.
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Economic stimulus legislation aimed at helping avert a U.S. recession might not be passed by the U.S. Senate until as late as Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said on Thursday.
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With temporary spy law expansion set to expire Feb. 1, the Bush administration is ratcheting up pressure for a broader permanent replacement. Not so fast, say Democratic leaders.
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U.S. lawmakers said on Friday it was  increasingly unlikely they could deliver a measure to overhaul  U.S. spy agencies to President Bush by the Nov. 2 elections, a  delay some supporters said could imperil the post Sept. 11  reforms.
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Congress fails to pass electronic-surveillance and phone-records-privacy legislation before recessing.
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Stymied by Republicans on the Sept. 11 commission bill and a lobbying overhaul, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., threatened Friday to take away senatorsÃ¢ÂÂ August vacation time.
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Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid on Monday abruptly postponed until next month consideration of a measure to give immunity to telephone companies that participated in President George W. Bush's warrantless domestic spying program.
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Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist introduces a bill that combines the controversial military commission bill with a bill radically expanding government spying power. But has this election year strategy been torpedoed by rogue Republicans? In 27B Stroke 6.