Michael Roston
Friday June 8, 2007
The Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee strongly criticized
the Justice Department for obstructing an investigation of
the Bush administration's warrantless spying program. The
statement came after the committee scheduled a hearing next
week to authorize subpoenas related to the shadowy government
program.
"The warrantless wiretapping program has operated for
over five years outside of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance
Act (FISA) and without the approval of the FISA Court. The
Committee has continued to ask for the legal justification
for this sweeping and secret program, and has continually been
rebuffed by inadequate and at times, misleading, responses
from this Justice Department," said Senator Patrick Leahy
(D-VT), who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, in a statement
sent to RAW STORY. "The information we have requested
has been specific to the legal justification for this program
and is firmly within the Committee’s oversight jurisdiction."
Leahy's statement came after his committee had announced earlier
in the day that it planned to "authorize subpoenas in
connection with investigation of legal basis for warrantless
wiretap program," according to the committee's website.
The meeting will occur on Thursday, June 14.
The Senator noted his frustration with the lack of response
from the Attorney General on the earlier requests for information
sent by the Committee on the program.
"The Justice Department’s continued frustration
of this Committee’s attempts to carry out its constitutional
oversight function is unfortunate," he added in the statement. "We
will continue in our pursuit of this information until we get
it, so that we can carry out our constitutional duties."
In a hearing Thursday afternoon at the House Judiciary Committee,
a Justice Department official refused to turn over President
Bush's legal justification for the warrantless spying program.
"Those [Office of Legal Counsel opinions] reflect the
internal confidential legal advice of the executive branch," said
Steven G. Bradbury, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General
in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. "We
are citing the confidentiality interests that the executive
branch has in internal confidential deliberative advice of
the executive branch."
The program is operated by the National Security Agency and
legally certified by the Justice Department.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), who chairs the subcommittee on
constitutional issues and is investigating the program, slammed
the Bush White House's actions in warrantless eavesdropping.
"We rejected monarchy in this country more than 200 years
ago...This President appears to have forgotten that fact," he
said in his opening statement. "Not only has he asserted
the right to go around the FISA Court and the Wiretap Act,
but he has actually done so."
Nadler went further in an earlier interview with Talking Points
Memo's Josh Marshall.
"This entire warrantless wiretapping is illegal and the
President and Attorney General are engaged in a criminal conspiracy.
I mean, to me this is worse than Watergate," he said in
the video interview.
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