Lawmakers threaten FBI over spy powers
By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS, Associated Press Writer
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070320/ap_on_go_co/national_security_letters
Republicans and Democrats sternly warned the FBI on Tuesday that it could
lose its broad power to collect telephone, e-mail and financial records to
hunt terrorists after revelations of widespread abuses of the authority
detailed in a recent internal investigation.
Their threats came as the Justice Department's chief watchdog, Glenn A.
Fine, told the House Judiciary Committee that the FBI engaged in widespread
and serious misuse of its authority in illegally collecting the information
from Americans and foreigners through so-called national security letters.
If the FBI doesn't move swiftly to correct the mistakes and problems
revealed last week in Fine's 130-page report, "you probably won't have NSL
authority," said Rep. Dan Lungren (news, bio, voting record), R-Calif., a
supporter of the power, referring to the data requests by their initials.
"From the attorney general on down, you should be ashamed of yourself," said
Rep. Darrell Issa (news, bio, voting record), R-Calif. "We stretched to try
to give you the tools necessary to make America safe, and it is very, very
clear that you've abused that trust."
If Congress revokes some of the expansive law enforcement powers it granted
in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, Issa said, "America may be less safe,
but the Constitution will be more secure, and it will be because of your
failure to deal with this in a serious fashion."
The FBI's failure to establish sufficient controls or oversight for
collecting the information constituted "serious and unacceptable" failures,
Fine told the committee.
Democrats called Fine's findings an example of how the Justice Department
has used broad counterterrorism authorities to trample on privacy rights.
"This was a serious breach of trust," said Rep. John Conyers (news, bio,
voting record), D-Mich., the Judiciary chairman. "The department had
converted this tool into a handy shortcut to illegally gather vast amounts
of private information while at the same time significantly underreporting
its activities to Congress."
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (news, bio, voting record), D-N.Y., said Congress should
revise the USA Patriot Act, which substantially loosened controls over the
letters.
"We do not trust government always to be run by angels, especially not this
administration," Nadler said. "It is not enough to mandate that the FBI fix
internal management problems and recordkeeping, because the statute itself
authorizes the unchecked collection of information on innocent Americans."
Some Republicans, however, said the FBI's expanded spying powers were vital
to tracking terrorists.
"The problem is enforcement of the law, not the law itself," said Rep. Lamar
Smith (news, bio, voting record) of Texas, the panel's senior GOP member.
"We need to be vigilant to make sure these problems are fixed."
Fine said he did not believe the problems were intentional, although he
acknowledged he could not rule that out.
"We believe the misuses and the problems we found generally were the product
of mistakes, carelessness, confusion, sloppiness lack of training, lack of
adequate guidance and lack of adequate oversight," Fine said.
"It really was unacceptable and inexcusable what happened here," he added
under questioning.
Valerie Caproni, the FBI's general counsel, said she took responsibility for
the abuses and believed they could be fixed in a matter of months.
"We're going to have to work to get the trust of this committee back, and we
know that's what we have to do, and we're going to do it," she said.
In a review of headquarters files and a sampling of just four of the FBI's
56 field offices, Fine found 48 violations of law or presidential directives
during between 2003 and 2005, including failure to get proper authorization,
making improper requests and unauthorized collection of telephone or
Internet e-mail records. He estimated that "a significant number of ...
violations throughout the FBI have not been identified or reported."
The bureau has launched an audit of all 56 field offices to determine the
full extent of the problem. The Senate Judiciary Committee is to hear
Wednesday from Fine and FBI Director Robert Mueller on the same topic.
In 1986, Congress first authorized FBI agents to obtain electronic records
without approval from a judge using national security letters. The letters
can be used to acquire e-mails, telephone, travel records and financial
information, like credit and bank transactions.
In 2001, the Patriot Act eliminated any requirement that the records belong
to someone under suspicion. Now an innocent person's records can be obtained
if FBI field agents consider them merely relevant to an ongoing terrorism or
spying investigation.
Fine's review, authorized by Congress over Bush administration objections,
concluded the number of national security letters requested by the FBI
skyrocketed after the Patriot Act became law in 2001.
Fine found more than 700 cases in which FBI agents obtained telephone
records through "exigent letters" which asserted that grand jury subpoenas
had been requested for the data, when in fact such subpoenas never been
sought.
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