Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1105 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to inform Members that the Intelligence Committee has received a classified document from the Department of Justice that is related to the PATRIOT Act authorities currently set to expire at the end of the month.

The House may consider a 1-year extension of the PATRIOT Act today so the Intelligence Committee will be making this document available for Member review in the committee offices located in HVC-304. Staff from the Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, as well as personnel from the Justice Department and with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, will be available to answer any questions that Members may have. Members who want to review the document should call the Intelligence Committee to schedule an appointment.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from California, my good friend, Mr. Dreier. All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days with which to revise and extend their remarks and to insert extraneous materials into the Record.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the resolution, as announced by our Clerk, provides for consideration of H.R. 2701, the Intelligence Authorization Act for fiscal year 2010, under a structured rule. The resolution waives all points of order against consideration of the bill except those arising under clause 9 of rule XXI. The resolution provides 1 hour of debate on the bill, makes in order only those amendments printed in the rule, and the resolution waives all points of order against such amendments except those arising under clause 9 or 10 of rule XXI.

The resolution provides one motion to recommit with or without instructions and provides that the Chair may entertain a motion to rise only if offered by the Chair of the Intelligence Committee or his designee and provides that the Chair may not entertain a motion to strike the enacting words of the bill.

The resolution provides for a motion to consider the Senate bill and substitute its text with the text of H.R. 2701 as passed by the House. The resolution waives all points of order against the Senate bill and its consideration. It also makes in order a motion that the House insist on its amendment and request a conference with the Senate and waives all points of order against such motion.

The resolution waives a requirement of clause 6(a) of rule XIII for a two-thirds vote for same-day consideration of a report from the Rules Committee through the legislative day of Friday, February 26. It also permits the Speaker to consider motions to suspend the rules through the legislative day of Friday, February 26. The Speaker shall consult with the minority leader on the designation of any matter under this authority.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the rule providing for consideration of H.R. 2701, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010.

As vice chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, I know that the intelligence community is the first line of defense against terrorists, proliferators of weapons of mass destruction, and other rogue elements who wish to do us and our allies harm here at home and across the globe.

This legislation provides policy guidance for 16 agencies of the intelligence community while also improving oversight and helping to prevent disastrous consequences that faulty intelligence and a misinformed Congress can have on national security.

Mr. Speaker, I have the honor and privilege of meeting many of our intelligence professionals in over 50 countries around the world during my oversight travel as a member of the Intelligence Committee. I cannot overstate how much I and the members of the committee, and I am sure all Members of this body, appreciate them and are humbled by their service. Their dedication and commitment became more evident when seven Americans made the ultimate sacrifice during a terrorist attack in Khost, Afghanistan, this past December.

But the attempted terrorist attack on Northwest Flight 253 on Christmas Day was a startling reminder to all Americans that in spite of our best efforts we are still under attack, and we still have much work to do to get it right. The constant threat from violent extremists reinforces that now more than ever, and we must give the intelligence community the resources and flexibility it needs to thwart the continuing and emerging threats to United States national security.

For the last 4 years, our country has gone without an intelligence authorization bill. I find it very distressing that the House Intelligence Committee, which was created to ensure proper oversight and accountability of our intelligence community, has worked diligently every year to pass a bill but has not seen one signed into law in recent years.

As we have seen, the intelligence community is in dire need of independent oversight. Sadly, when we created the Director of National Intelligence, we did not create an independent Inspector General. This bill would remedy that flaw by making clear that the Inspector General does not serve at the whim of the Director of National Intelligence and also has an independent responsibility to keep Congress informed.

Some of my colleagues on the other aisle have argued against the creation of a new Inspector General. I would respectfully disagree with their assessment. It is clear that this provision will help to streamline and coordinate oversight.

This bill also contains a provision in the manager's amendment providing sensible reforms to the Gang of Eight process. As vice chairman of the committee, I have seen that process abused in the past, and I am glad that we are taking a careful step towards reform. I believe that the administration has a statutory and constitutional duty to keep members of the Intelligence Committee, all members of the Intelligence Committee, fully informed on certain intelligence matters. Therefore, by reforming this process, the bill enhances transparency and bolsters Congress' capacity to conduct important oversight.

The bill also clarifies the responsibility of the Director of National Intelligence to cooperate with GAO investigations initiated by Congress. GAO can provide the Congress with valuable expertise and assist with oversight functions, especially in areas of auditing and security clearance reforms.

I have stated time and time again that the intelligence community is not diverse enough to do its job of stealing and analyzing foreign countries' secrets. Diversity is a mission imperative. When I came on this committee, I came on after the legendary Lou Stokes, who served on this committee and advanced many measures that are in law today dealing with intelligence. My good friend and my good friend from California's good friend, Julian Dixon, who has departed life, carried that banner, as did Sanford Bishop when he was on this committee.

I, along with many other members of the committee, particularly Chairman Reyes, Anna Eshoo and others countless throughout the years, Jane Harman included, we have fought for continuing diversity on this committee. We need people who blend in, speak the language, and understand the cultures in the countries that we are targeting.

As my colleagues on the committee and I have mentioned on many occasions, when the intelligence leadership comes to testify, we don't see a lot of diversity at the table. We don't see enough women at the table. It is time for the community to get serious about improving diversity for the sake of our national security.

A real diversity effort means more than just staging recruitment drives at colleges with a lot of black students or Latino students. Diversity means hiring, hiring more Arab Americans. It means hiring more Iranian Americans, more Pakistani Americans, more Chinese Americans and more Korean Americans. If the intelligence community is to succeed in its global mission, it must have a global face.

I have offered an amendment on diversity in the intelligence community to the underlying bill. My amendment contains a requirement for the Director of National Intelligence to report to Congress on a comprehensive plan to improve diversity in the intelligence community. It calls on the Director to report on specific implementation plans for each element agency in the community. It also requires information on plans to improve minority retention, not only at the junior and mid- grade levels, but at the senior and management levels as well.

Finally, it requires that the Director of National Intelligence report to the congressional Intelligence Committees on the efforts being made with diversity training and how improvement in diversity will be measured. This amendment, along with many other important provisions in this bill, will make our intelligence community more effective, more efficient, and more accountable.

Given the immense security challenges facing our Nation, it is vital that Congress pass this legislation so that we may continue to fulfill our commitment to the safety and well-being of the great American people.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

You know, Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my good friend from California's desire to address Flight 253; but in my view, his complaints that the bill is outdated ignores the rule. The rule makes in order an amendment by Representative Schauer directed at the lessons of Flight 253.

Now, listen, the intelligence community, constituted of 16 elements, is organic. It is constantly in a state of change, and there is considerable coordination and collaboration regarding the globe, not just one airplane, not just one individual. And when you isolate one individual, like the person that was on Flight 253, you do have that anomaly to show that we are steadily being set upon. But that was mild by comparison to some of those incidents that never make it in the public realm.

I am reminded of the constant saying that success has a thousand fathers, but failure evidently doesn't even have a mother because anytime there is a failure, the whole community is set upon, while day after day after day, year after year after year they're stopping countless attacks on this country that go unnoticed, whether it be in the field of cyber, whether it be on the battlefield. We are constantly in that position. There have been hundreds of successes to protect our homeland security.

Certainly I will yield to my friend.

Well, when you speak of the President's directions, there were several principal matters that the President referenced in his, as you put it, threatened veto. But the veto, more specifically, the principal objection was to the Gang of Eight restriction that many of us in the committee supported for the reason that we think--and thought--that each of the intelligence members should be advised by the President the same as those of the Gang of Eight.

You know, we use these terms around here. The Gang of Eight are the central players--the Speaker, the minority leader, the majority leader, and the committee Chairs and ranking members. That is who that small kernel of people are who receive specific information. I hope the public at least understands some aspect of that.

The point that I was trying to make and will continue to make is--let me give you a for example. In the last month, I have visited our intelligence operations in nine countries, including Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Ukraine, Germany, just to mention a few. In each of those places--and there were others that will go unmentioned--in each of those places I learned of immense success and reporting of successes coming back here to the intelligence community and to the President. Nobody talks about that in the newspaper. Nobody talks about that in this particular setting. You pick three incidents out of thousands of successes and point to a community's failures. I can't accept that.

For 10 years I have watched on this committee these people work their hearts out, Republicans and Democrats, under the leadership of--friends of mine and yours--Porter Goss, who led this committee, others long before Leon Panetta, and the other committees that don't even get mentioned at all because most people don't even know that they have intelligence operations. What would happen in this world, what would happen with our allies if we did not have the SIGNET? How would we be having the successes that we are having in Afghanistan today of picking off leaders of Taliban, leaders of al Qaeda?

All the time it seems to me that all that comes out as is, oh, they just took out another one, but it doesn't get played up. If one of them managed to get to Canada and to the United States, then that would be the biggest talk that we would have here in Congress. It's not fair, and fairness to the intelligence community is as deserving as any other parts of our bureaucracy that fail considerably, including this institution.

I was going to yield my time, and I ask the gentleman to take his time, but I am more than happy to yield.

Well, then, I will just take my time back, now that you agree with me.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I have listened to my colleague, who is an absolutely brilliant member of the intelligence community, and he has provided continuing and dedicated service for the period of time that he and I have served on the committee together. There is one thing, I think, I know a little bit more about than he does, and that is our prison system, and that is for the reason that I participated, as a State and a Federal judge and then as a lawyer, in dealing with circumstances in our prisons.

Our colleague suggests that detainees are treated in a certain way, and those particular things--for example, food and the length of the hair or religious convictions--have been litigated ad nauseam in the United States. I can assure you that persons who are in custody in the United States find themselves able to access to the food that comports with their religious requirements and also the other circumstances.

One thing that is great about America is that we do have values, and one thing that is great about us in handling others, even much better than they even ever consider us, is that those values manifest themselves in the treatment of persons who are our enemies.

Now, I am going to try with this document here to put to rest this not-in-my-backyard argument that I continue to hear from my colleagues about Guantanamo.

I first want to commend to my colleagues H.R. 3728, the Detainment Reform Act of 2009, which I filed, and I would urge them to look at it and to look at the detention criteria and at the ways to process detainees, as well as the reporting requirements that transpire. I will not take the time now to go into detail, but that measure is sitting here, and any one of them can join it. I have no pride of authorship, and I've said to Members on the other side and on our side that, if there is something they can add or detract, then please do so.

Regarding where you put people whom we hold and somehow or another the thought being that we can't try people in our Federal system or, for that matter, if we have a situation where every detainee must be tried in military commissions, according to some, well, let me tell you some of the people whom we hold in one prison today.

According to the Bureau of Prisons, ADX Supermax in Florence, Colorado, has a capacity of 490 inmates. There are currently 445, leaving 45 cells available. I can assure you anybody in Guantanamo could be transferred here with no threat to Florence, Colorado. No one has ever escaped Supermax. Supermax officers are some of the best trained in the Nation, and current and former inmates include--let me just give you some of these people:

Anthony Casso, a mobster and former underboss of the Lucchese crime family, is at this prison. Wadih el-Hage, a coconspirator in the 1998 United States Embassy bombings, is in this prison. Matthew Hale, a white supremacist leader convicted of soliciting the murder of a Federal judge, is in this prison. Larry Hoover, the leader of the Gangster Disciples Nation, based in Chicago, is in this prison. Jeff Fort, the cofounder of the Black P. Stones gang in Chicago and the founder of its El Rukn faction, is in this prison. Omar Portee, the cofounder of the United Blood Nation, is in this prison and has never escaped. Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, is in this prison in Colorado. Juan Matta-Ballesteros, the drug trafficker and coconspirator in the Enrique Camarena case, is in this prison. Zacarias Moussaoui-- remember him? He was tried in our regular system as a coconspirator in the September 11, 2001, attacks. Guess where he is? In Colorado, in Supermax. Terry Nichols, the Oklahoma City bomber, is in this prison. Richard Colvin Reid, the Islamic terrorist, nicknamed the ``Shoe Bomber,'' who also came through our regular system under the aegis of the previous President, is in this prison. Eric Robert Rudolph, convicted of the 1996 Olympic Park bombing, is in this prison. Dwight York is in this prison. Ramzi Yousef, of the World Trade Center bombing, is in this prison.

Enough of this ``not in my backyard.'' We can hold these people.

H. Rap Brown is in this prison. Thomas Silverstein, convicted of murdering a Federal correctional officer, is in this prison. Luis Felipe, founder of the Almighty Latin Kings and Queens Nation, is in this prison. Howard Mason, a drug trafficker, who ordered the murder of Police Officer Eddie Byrne, is in this prison. A leading member of the Aryan Brotherhood, Barry Mills, is in this prison.

So what are you all talking about when you stand around and tell people that we can't hold people in this Supermax prison? We can hold them in Guantanamo. We can hold them in Supermax, and we can do everything that is required of us as a nation in order to protect ourselves in that regard.

Yet what has happened in this institution is you have given the American people a chance to believe that they should be afraid if you hold them in certain institutions in your neighborhoods. Well, they come through your neighborhoods an awful lot, and you evidently don't know about it. I, personally, am just a little tired of your not-in-my- backyard attitude about this particular system. We can hold terrorists, and we can hold criminals, and we've been doing it all of my adult career, and that's 50 years as a lawyer.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, before yielding to my good friend on the Rules Committee, I would just like to comment regarding my good friend, Mr. Lungren's comments.

Mr. Lungren, there have been three people who have been convicted in military commissions, and two of them are already free. During that same period of time, under President Bush's administration and under in President Obama's administration, more than 300 people have been convicted in our civilian courts.

And you're correct. I was using the people in the Supermax to make the point no matter who they were, whether they were Zacarias Moussaoui, who certainly isn't an American citizen, or countless others, that we can hold them and that they can't escape. The fear some seem to think is that they would escape.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to my colleague on the Rules Committee, the distinguished gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Perlmutter).

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to have to teach law here, and I never wanted to do that.

The language in the manager's amendment restates existing criminal law prohibitions like those in the Detainee Treatment Act and clearly establishes that the United States will adhere to the rule of law, and that's whether a person is in Guantanamo or whether they are in Colorado.

That said, at this time I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentlewoman from New Hampshire (Ms. Shea-Porter).

Mr. Speaker, I'd inquire if my colleague has any remaining speakers. I'm the last speaker for this side, and I will reserve my time until the gentleman closes.

Mr. Speaker, this is a responsible bill that will enhance vital human intelligence collection, fill the critical gaps in our intelligence-gathering activities, authorize significant investment in our Nation's cybersecurity capabilities, as well as provide much needed reform by forbidding the CIA's practice of outsourcing interrogation to private contractors operating outside the law.

It is unfortunate that we live in a dangerous and different world, where we must always be vigilant of those who wish to cause harm to others. This bill is critical to addressing the many challenges we face within the intelligence community.

I want to take this moment of personal privilege to thank Chairman Reyes and the staff of the House Select Committee on Intelligence, the Republican and Democratic staff, for their extraordinary hard work and dedication in helping to see this excellent bill to fruition.

Four years is far too long for the intelligence community to go without guidance from its oversight committees. I believe we should get an authorization bill passed and on the President's desk for signature into law. There is going to be added general debate. But when I listened to my colleague, who is my good friend, I kind of feel like that all of the labor on both sides, including speakers that I served with on that committee, Mr. Thornberry and Mr. Rogers, we have worked very actively to get us to the position that we are in with reference to this authorization bill. There have been agreements and there have been disagreements. And there are always things that can be added.

The responsibility of the Rules Committee is to move the agenda. I am very proud of the fact that there is a summit on health care going on at the White House at the same time that we are discussing the authorization bill, and that I am getting ready to leave here and go to a jobs task force, which I believe is high on the minds of the American agenda, which proves that we really can do legislation, prepare legislation, chew gum and walk at the same time. We are an incredible lot of people we are, and just like that we can also secure this Nation, as this bill does in high kind.

But I am going to say to you all one more time, enough of the business about not in my backyard. If I didn't dispel it today, I will see you another time on the floor to have you understand just how extraordinary the Federal judiciary is, just how extraordinary the intelligence community is, and just how important it is to our Nation's security that we allow them to function accordingly.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

The previous question was ordered.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak about the Intelligence Authorization Act for fiscal year 2010, S. 1494, that the Senate has approved by unanimous consent.

The legislation is the product of a bipartisan effort in the Intelligence Committee, which was reflected by the committee's unanimous vote of 15 to 0 on the bill. I thank Vice Chairman Bond for his efforts on the legislation and the full committee staff for their work.

It has been 4 years since the Congress has passed and the President has signed an intelligence authorization act. This has meant that the law has not kept up with changes in the intelligence community and that Congress has not been able to require reforms and provide flexibilities that are sorely needed. I am pleased that the Senate has taken a major step toward enactment.

Before summarizing some of the key provisions of this legislation, let me briefly describe the way in which it was written.

The committee has worked with the Director of National Intelligence, DNI, ADM Dennis Blair, to identify areas where legislation is needed to better run and oversee the Nation's 16 intelligence agencies. Many of these provisions have been proposed and included in previous legislation reported out by the Intelligence Committee but have yet to be passed into law.

At the request of the White House, we have separated issues of terrorist detention and interrogation from this bill and the committee intends to take up legislation on those issues separately. The committee has not changed its position from previous legislation on the need to have an effective and humane interrogation program that operates fully within the nation's laws and international commitments.

The major themes of this bill are to strengthen the Director of National Intelligence to make sure that he has the management authorities and flexibilities needed to direct the intelligence community; insist upon stronger accountability and oversight mechanisms for intelligence activities, both within the executive branch and by the Congress; and to fund fully the intelligence community's share of the war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan and the continuing counterterrorism operations against al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations worldwide.

There is also a classified annex to this bill, which lays out the authorized funding levels for the National Intelligence Program. The theme of the annex is to shift funds from intelligence activities that are less capable, lower priority, or not performing to those that will provide the Nation with better capabilities for intelligence collection, analysis, counterintelligence, and covert action.

The details of the classified annex are necessarily secret, but all Members are welcome to review them at the committee's offices at any time.

Let me describe some of the notable provisions in more detail.

To add to the management authorities of the Director of National Intelligence, the bill gives the Director of National Intelligence greater flexibility in personnel matters, including extending the length of time that personnel may be detailed to an intelligence agency to 3 years from the current 1 year. It also provides the Director, working with individual intelligence agencies, to shift or hire personnel by up to 5 percent above authorized personnel levels if intelligence requirements demand doing so. The bill authorizes the DNI to conduct accountability reviews of personnel and elements within the intelligence community, further clarifying that the Director is the senior official in the intelligence community. It seeks to prevent repetitions of information sharing problems by enabling the DNI to purchase necessary equipment or technology to improve information sharing with governmental departments or agencies regardless of whether they are part of the intelligence community. The bill also requires the intelligence community to continue putting in place the information technology necessary to assure information flows between its agencies.

The committee has longstanding concerns with the way the intelligence community has briefed, or has failed to brief, the congressional Intelligence Committees on all intelligence activities and covert actions. Two major controversies, over CIA detention and interrogation and over the warrantless surveillance program of the National Security Agency, were both briefed only to the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The rest of the committee's membership was unaware of these programs for years.

The bill strengthens the statutory requirements to keep the congressional intelligence committees ``fully and currently informed'' of intelligence activities and covert actions. The legislation makes clear that there is no exception to the obligation to brief Congress on intelligence activities and covert actions; requires that notifications include a description of the legal authority on which activities are undertaken; and requires that all committee members be provided with the broad outlines--the ``main features''--of intelligence programs in those instances where the sensitive operational details are provided only to a limited number of Senators.

In addition to ensuring that notifications to the Congress are conducted, the bill includes a number of additional provisions intended to strengthen intelligence oversight. These include creating an independent inspector general, confirmed by the Senate, to help the DNI oversee the intelligence community and strengthening the inspectors general of the National Security Agency, NSA, Defense Intelligence Agency, DIA, National Reconnaissance Office, NRO, and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, NGA, by listing them

under the Inspector General Act of 1978.

They include requiring Senate confirmation for the Directors of the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and for the Deputy Director of the CIA. For several years, the Intelligence Committee has viewed these positions as holding substantial budgetary and policy responsibilities.

They also include improving the intelligence community's ability to budget, manage finances, and run program acquisitions. I am unable to state publicly why these provisions are so important, but it is fair to say that intelligence agencies have had major failures in this regard. In this bill, we have sought to apply best practices from other parts of the government to intelligence community management and acquisitions with the goal of more efficiently and effectively using taxpayer dollars to fund intelligence activities.

Finally, while I am unable to provide specifics due to reasons of classification, let me highlight five other parts of the bill and its classified annex that merit recognition.

Satellites. To address a problem created by years of mismanagement and acquisition failures, the annex to this bill recommends a more capable and more affordable imagery satellite architecture that addresses the requirements of both our civilian policymakers and military warfighters.

Languages. As our committee report notes, the intelligence community's language capabilities are abysmal. This bill authorizes increased funding to significantly improve language proficiencies. Rather than funding separate initiatives across the various intelligence agencies, this funding is provided to the Director of National Intelligence for allocation and coordination to maximize effectiveness.

Research and Development. The U.S. intelligence community leads the world in the technical collection of intelligence. This success is the result of decades of investment in research and development. The annex to this bill recommends increases in investment on research and development to return to the level of funding necessary to maintain the nation's technological edge.

Cybersecurity. The committee has held numerous hearings with the Acting Senior Director for Cybersecurity in the National Security Council, the Director of the National Security Agency, and the committee's Technical Advisory Group. I believe strongly that cyber attack and espionage by adversary nations and nonstate actors pose a grave threat to our Nation's national and economic security. I also believe, however, that initiatives underway to provide for security of the government's cyber networks need to be implemented and overseen carefully to ensure that privacy rights are upheld.

For this reason, the bill includes a provision that establishes a framework for executive and congressional oversight for cybersecurity. Specifically, it requires reporting to Congress on the legal authorities for cyber-security programs, privacy assessments, and details of the concept of operations for these activities. The provision also requires thorough auditing of cyber-security programs by the relevant inspectors general, especially to determine compliance with law and privacy rights. Finally, the provision authorizes the detail of cyber experts from the intelligence community to the Department of Homeland Security and FBI to assist in their roles in cyber defense and law enforcement. The annex to the bill also adjusts funding levels to ensure that the President's request for cyber- security activities are appropriately funded and are proceeding under clear legal and policy guidance.

Report on compliance with laws related to detention and interrogation. As I noted, the administration and our committee continue to conduct reviews of detention and interrogation practices begun after September 11, 2001. This bill requires the DNI to report on how the intelligence community complies with all laws, international obligations, and executive orders related to the detention and interrogation of persons under their control.

Following the reporting of our bill on July 22, we have worked with three committees of the Senate to resolve several questions.

We have worked with the Armed Services Committee to develop a Senate resolution that will govern the sequence of referral, between that committee and the Intelligence Committee, of nominations for Director of the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. That resolution has the support of Chairman Levin and Ranking Member McCain of the Armed Services Committee, as well as having my and Vice Chairman Bond's support. I will address the proposed resolution in a separate colloquy today with Chairman Levin.

We have worked with Ranking Member Cochran of the Appropriations Committee on an agreement to strike, in a managers' amendment, section 341 of the bill that would have expressed the sense of the Senate on an Appropriations Subcommittee on Intelligence. That internal Senate matter will continue to be discussed within the Senate but will not be a part of this bill.

We have worked with Chairman Leahy of the Judiciary Committee to resolve several matters. The managers' amendment that Vice Chairman Bond and I have offered amends three provisions which require the submission of reports on various matters. The purpose of the amendments to sections 336, 407, and 445 is to ensure that the Judiciary Committee receives reports on matters within its jurisdiction. In consultation with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the managers' amendment amends section 411 on a FOIA operational file exemption to state more precisely the intent of the provision. The managers' amendment also strikes section 352 that establishes a FOIA exemption for terrorist identity information that is disseminated for terrorist screening purposes. As a comparable provision has been reported in the House, we expect that the provision will be the subject of further consideration at conference.

Mr. President, the vice chairman and I have worked hard to produce bipartisan legislation that provides the intelligence community with the tools and resources needed to keep the Nation safe and to inform decisionmakers. This bill does just that. It strikes a balance between allowing intelligence agencies the latitude to conduct their operations while ensuring their legality and efficiency.

I very much appreciate the Senate's approval of this legislation and look forward to bringing a conference report to the Senate as soon as possible.

Mr. President, section 432 of S. 1494, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal year 2010 that is before the Senate today, provides that the Directors of the National Security Agency, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and the National Reconnaissance Office shall be appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate. For several years, the Select Committee on Intelligence has been seeking the enactment of legislation to provide for Senate confirmation of these important positions. The Senate has previously endorsed this effort by including this requirement in the proposed Intelligence Authorization for Fiscal Year 2008.

It is our strong hope that the time has come to enact this fundamental measure to ensure adequate oversight of these three agencies whose spending constitutes a significant portion of the entire intelligence budget. In preparation for that, my colleague at the Intelligence Committee, our vice chairman Kit Bond, and I have worked with the leadership of the Armed Services Committee, Chairman Carl Levin and Ranking Member John McCain, to settle on the process by which our two committees will assist the Senate in a careful examination of the qualifications of nominees to head these agencies. The insights of both committees is important in that process because the three entities are housed in the Department of Defense and perform significant responsibilities there while also being major components of the intelligence community.

The resolution that we have prepared recognizes the contribution that each of our committees should make to a thorough and timely process. It provides that if the nominee is an Active-Duty military officer, the confirmation process will begin in the Armed Services Committee and, if reported, the nomination will be sequentially referred to the Intelligence Committee for a prescribed period of time; namely, 30 days plus an additional 5 days if the 30-day period expires when the Senate is in recess. If the nominee is a civilian, the confirmation process will begin in the Intelligence Committee with a sequential referral to the Armed Services Committee under those same time limits. To ensure that the sequential referral does not delay completion of the committee part of the nomination process, the resolution provides for the automatic discharge of the nominations from the second committee if it has not reported with the prescribed period of time.

This referral system recognizes the equities of each committee and will ensure that the Senate receives the benefit of the recommendations made by the two committees with the expertise necessary to advise the Senate about the qualifications of nominees to head these three important agencies.

Although we are not formally introducing the resolution at this time, Vice Chairman Bond joins me in this public commitment to the Senate that we will ask our committee to report the resolution in time for consideration and adoption by the Senate in conjunction with a conference report on the fiscal year 2010 Intelligence authorization.

I ask unanimous consent that the full text of the resolution, showing its cosponsorship by myself, Senator Levin, Senator Bond, and Senator McCain, be printed in the Record at the conclusion of the colloquy.

I should note for the Senate that while the full text of the amendment includes language pertinent to other nominations, such as the Assistant Attorney General for National Security, the substantive change to section 17 of S. Res. 400 only bears on the sequence of responsibilities between the Armed Services and Intelligence Committees.

I now turn to Senator Levin for his remarks.

I yield myself such time as I might consume.

(Mr. DREIER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, let me first express my appreciation to my friend from Fort Lauderdale, a member

of both the Rules Committee and a distinguished member of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

Mr. Speaker, last Christmas Day, as we all know, when a passenger boarded Northwest Airlines Flight 253 headed for the Detroit Metro Airport, the issue of national security once again came to the forefront, to the top of the agenda for everyone in our country. This is, of course, never, never far from our minds. But in recent months, as several high-profile terrorist plots have been thwarted, the tragic shooting at Fort Hood had taken place and our troops continue to fight two wars, we know that the threat of attacks on Americans remains a very real threat to us.

What was so shocking and revealing about the attempted attack on Christmas Day was not that al Qaeda remains a threat. This much we all know. What was most troubling to the American people was the revelation that key information was available that could have prevented Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from ever boarding that plane in the first place.

Last month, December 25, as everyone, including the President has acknowledged, the system failed us. If not for the perpetrator's failure to properly detonate the device and the heroic acts of his fellow passengers, this attempted attack would have become a horrible, horrible tragedy. It was not careful intelligence gathering, analysis, and coordination that saved the people on that plane; it was luck and the quick thinking on the part of those very courageous passengers.

Mr. Speaker, the American people rightly began, immediately after Christmas, on Christmas Day and thereafter, to ask questions about what is being done to address this failure that allowed Abdulmutallab to board that plane. What exactly what wrong? How can we fix the system? What can we do to ensure that this kind of failure never, ever happens again.

Now, in light of these questions, it would seem appropriate that today we would be considering our annual intelligence authorization bill. Now is the time to compile the lessons learned from the attempted attack on Flight 253, the Fort Hood shooting, the numerous arrests of would-be terrorists like Najibullah Zazi and David Headley and the continued items that obviously we don't hear about out there.

Now is the time to take, Mr. Speaker, these new insights and reform our intelligence agencies and policies to better protect our homeland and the American people, and that has to remain the top priority. That is where all of the attention should be focused. And yet, inexplicably, we are considering a bill today that is nearly 8 months old. This legislation was reported out of committee in June of last year. It was written before any of these recent attacks and attempted attacks took place, before any of these new revelations of flaws in our system and before any analysis was conducted on how to fix them.

Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, the Democratic majority's decision to bring up this hopelessly outdated bill is made all the more inexplicable by the fact that it was known to be a seriously flawed bill even back in June when it was being finalized. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the Obama administration released a scathing criticism of this legislation and even issued a veto threat.

According to the Statement of Administration Policy from July 8 of last year: ``The administration has serious concerns with a number of provisions that would impede the smooth and efficient functioning of the intelligence community and that would raise a number of policy, management, legal and constitutional concerns.'' That is the Statement of Administration Policy.

The statement went on to elaborate on the bill's flaws: the serious risk of compromising highly sensitive data, the new layers of bureaucracy, the impediments to building an intelligence workforce for the 21st century, the wasted resources. These were not the accusations, Mr. Speaker of political adversaries; these were the serious criticisms of President Obama. And they were leveled nearly 8 months ago before a whole host of new challenges made themselves apparent to us. If this was a flawed bill last July, as the President clearly defined it as being, it is now a flat-out dangerous bill.

I believe that the American people will be stunned to learn that the Democratic majority has chosen, with this legislation, to simply ignore the grave new concerns that have been raised in recent months. No lessons have been learned and no new solutions have been contemplated. The Democratic majority's bold approach is to take up an 8-month-old bill that wasn't even a good idea at the time and, as I said, was criticized harshly by President Obama.

The manner in which they are bringing this bill to the floor is just as troubling, Mr. Speaker. The Democratic majority will likely claim that a bipartisan amendment process has been allowed: five Democratic amendments were made in order, four Republican amendments, and three bipartisan amendments. But what these numbers mask is the fact that 21 Democratic amendments were included in the manager's amendments. This not only skews the process in a very partisan way, but it denies the Members of this body representing all Americans, representing Democrats and Republicans alike, the opportunity to vote on these 21 amendments individually based on their merits. We are denied the opportunity for transparency and scrutiny.

What's worse, Mr. Speaker, is that this rule has implications for legislation far beyond the intelligence bill at hand. This rule provides a blank check for the Democratic leadership to bring up any bill at any time today or tomorrow without a shred of transparency or even one moment of public scrutiny. This rule gives them carte blanche to take whatever legislative action they choose, entirely absent of any accountability.

And I've got to say, I was thinking about this last night when we were in the Rules Committee, to impose this kind of structure this early in a Congress--the second month of the second session of the 111th Congress--is beyond the pale. When such drastic and draconian measures are taken to shield their actions from all scrutiny, we can only ask ourselves, what exactly are they plotting? What exactly are they trying to hide from the American people?

Mr. Speaker, for the sake of the security of our homeland and for the sake of a return to the often-promised accountability and transparency, I urge my colleagues to reject this rule. What we need to do is we need to take a hard look at the intelligence failures that have taken place. Let's ask the hows and the whys and make the necessary reforms that will ensure that we never again have to rely on blind luck to protect the American people.

Mr. Speaker, perhaps most important of all, we must reject this attempt to shield the Democratic majority's actions from public view.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank my friend for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, let me say that I completely concur with my colleague about this notion of our recognizing that day after day--and I had that in my opening remarks--day after day we are seeing the prevention of the kinds of attacks that we are all concerned about, and we congratulate and herald the intelligence community for that. I think that what we need to focus on is the Abdulmutallab situation, the Fort Hood shootings, and the Najibullah Zazi and David Headley arrests. These things have taken place since this bill had any kind of committee consideration last year. And all we are arguing is, yes, it's great that some amendments have been made in order--unfortunately, it's a very partisan item to have 21 amendments included in the manager's amendment--but we believe very strongly that the committee--and you know very well, having worked so hard on that committee, that a lot of work takes place in secrecy, understandably, that in dealing with these situations, that should happen before bringing a measure of this magnitude to the floor that even the President and so many others have acknowledged is flawed.

I thank my friend for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield for just 1 second?

I thank my friend for yielding. And Mr. Speaker, let me just say that I totally concur with absolutely everything my friend just said.

All I want to do is agree with you. So thank you very much.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am very, very happy to yield 4 minutes to the very hardworking and diligent and thoughtful ranking member of the Select Committee on Intelligence, our friend from Clarendon, Texas (Mr. Thornberry).

I am happy to yield to my friend an additional 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, let me just say that my friend from Gold River, California, has been attempting to engage in a colloquy with my friend.

I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Gold River, California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren), and I am sure that he will yield to the gentleman from Fort Lauderdale if he would like to respond in any way.

May I inquire of the Chair how much time is remaining on both sides before I yield to my friend from Gold River?

I yield an additional 1 minute to my friend from Gold River, California.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I might consume.

I would first say in response to my good friend from Colorado, Mr. Lungren has just reminded me that the moment one of these individuals is on American soil, they have enhanced rights that they would not otherwise have.

I would like to engage in a colloquy with the very distinguished ranking member of the Select Committee on Intelligence to discuss one of the amendments that unfortunately will not see the light of day, that we will not have the opportunity to debate other than in the context of the overall manager's amendment, which included 21 amendments from our Democratic colleagues, including the McDermott amendment.

Now, the McDermott amendment, which was discussed by my friend from Clarendon, is an amendment that provides basically carte blanche, an opportunity for any individual, one of these barbarians, to claim for religious reasons that they are being mistreated. The moment I heard the word ``Big Mac'' come forward from my friend Mac Thornberry, I have to say who's my Big Mac, but I thought, my gosh, someone could actually claim that being denied a Big Mac would be cruel and unusual punishment? And I've got to say as I look at the litany of items on here, including exploiting phobias of the individual, I just don't understand it. And I wonder if my friend might further enlighten us on this.

I'm happy to yield.

I thank my friend for his contribution.

He just reminded me that the speech that everyone heard, what was described as the ``Scott heard 'round the world'' when we saw Scott Brown elected to the United States Senate seat in Massachusetts, the line that came to the forefront was, I want to make sure that my tax dollars are expended on fighting against these terrorists rather than expending our tax dollars defending these terrorists. And the McDermott amendment takes and expends more time and effort and energy in defending them. And, unfortunately, the only discussion that we will have on this, Mr. Speaker, is during consideration of the rule because we're not going to have a chance to vote on this amendment other than its being included in the overall manager's amendment with 20 other amendments being included.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield 3 minutes to a very thoughtful new Member who has expended a great deal of time and energy trying to ensure that we can at least have a debate on the issue of bringing terrorists onto U.S. soil, my friend from Peoria, Mr. Schock.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to my friend from Illinois.

Let me say to my friend that I anxiously look forward to his spellbinding closing remarks that I'm sure we'll all be able to benefit from, but I have one other speaker and then I'll close and look forward to sitting patiently and listening to my friend.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I am happy to yield 2\1/2\ minutes to a hardworking member of the Intelligence Committee, a veteran of the FBI, the gentleman from Brighton, Michigan (Mr. Rogers).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, we all know where the eyes of the American people are focused right now, and it is not here on the House of Representatives. They are focused down across the street from the White House at the Blair House, where the health care summit is taking place. I have no idea how it is going. We have been managing this debate on an issue that is of paramount importance.

The five most important words in the middle of the preamble to the U.S. Constitution I regularly say are ``provide for the common defense.'' We need to recognize that this is priority number one, our Nation's intelligence. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, Najibullah Zazi, David Headley, these are names that have come to the forefront because these individuals pose a threat to the United States of America.

There is no issue that is more important for us to be focusing on. Mr. Lungren said earlier rather than having a 6-hour summit on the issue of health care, which we all acknowledge is important and needs to be addressed, the attention should be focused on national security. And unfortunately, it is not only not being focused on, but what we are doing here today is taking a flawed bill from July of last year, 8 months old, that was maligned and criticized by the statement of administration policy from President Obama, and what is it we have done? We have denied amendment after amendment.

Mr. Schock's very thoughtful amendment to deal with the issue of should we give enhanced rights to these people who have perpetrated terrible acts against us? Bring them onto U.S. soil, which would make that happen? We think we should have a chance to debate that issue. Should we take the 21 amendments that our Democratic colleagues have offered, including my friend, Mr. McDermott, who has an amendment that dramatically enhances the power of those individuals who have either tried or have perpetrated terrible acts against us and provides them new defense?

Again I mentioned Scott Brown earlier. And what resonated from his acceptance speech when he won the election was that we shouldn't be expending our taxpayer dollars on defending these terrorists. We should be expending our taxpayer dollars to fight to make sure they never, ever pose a threat against us. This is a terrible rule. It is a terrible rule because it denies the opportunity for debate. And the bill itself needs to be reworked by the Select Committee on Intelligence.

Mr. Speaker, we can do better. I urge my colleagues to reject it. Let's do the right thing.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam President. today the Senate passed a new version of the

Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 (S. 3611) with a manager's amendment to address key concerns of the Judiciary Committee. I appreciate the commitment of Senator Feinstein, the chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, to work with me to strengthen this important legislation. The bill the Senate has approved recognizes the shared jurisdiction of the committee on the Judiciary and the Select Committee on Intelligence in several legislative areas.

Last fall, when an earlier version of this bill--S. 1494--was considered by the Senate, I recognized that several provisions in the bill fell under the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee. Senator Feinstein and I engaged in serious negotiations concerning these provisions. We negotiated agreements regarding exemptions to the Freedom of Information Act, FOIA, as well as numerous reporting requirements, such as a significant, new requirement for the Federal Bureau of Investigation--FBI--an agency clearly under the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee, and an important new cybersecurity oversight provision.

Negotiations I undertook with Senator Feinstein last fall on the earlier version of the bill narrowed the operational files FOIA exemption for information provided by intelligence agencies to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, ODNI, and struck a FOIA (b)(3) exemption for terrorist identity information. Those agreements were preserved in the new version of the bill, S. 3611.

Senator Feinstein has told me she is also committed to ensuring that the Judiciary Committee will receive reports required by the bill's section 337, Cybersecurity Oversight. I appreciate Senator Feinstein's support for these improvements. The manager's amendment to the intelligence authorization bill agreed to today explicitly identifies the Judiciary Committee as a recipient of relevant reporting provisions.

The intelligence authorization bill includes several reporting requirements that involve areas of long-standing interest and jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee. The new version of the bill, S. 3611, ensures that the Judiciary Committee is a recipient of those reports. Section 333 of the bill directs the Director of National Intelligence to provide a comprehensive report on all measures taken by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and by elements of the intelligence community to comply with the provisions of applicable law, international obligations, and executive orders relating to the detention and interrogation activities of the intelligence community. These include compliance with the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005; the Military Commissions Act of 2006; common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions; the Convention Against Torture; Executive Order 13492, relating to lawful interrogations; and Executive Order 13493, relating to detention policy options.

The managers' amendment to the intelligence authorization bill modifies section 333 to ensure that to the extent that the report addresses an element of the intelligence community within the Department of Justice, it shall be submitted, along with associated material, to the Judiciary Committees of the House and Senate. This reporting requirement is a cornerstone of the agreement I reached with Senator Feinstein last year. I am pleased to see it retained in the bill we passed today.

I fought for years to obtain information about the Bush administration's detention and interrogation policies and practices, and the legal advice from that administration authorizing those policies and practices. The last administration refused to give this information to Congress, instead issuing secret legal advice that misconstrued our laws and international obligations with regard to the treatment of people in our custody. Years later we found out that the administration had sanctioned cruel interrogation techniques, including torture. It is imperative that the Judiciary Committee be fully informed of the extent to which the government is complying with our laws and international treaties relating to detention and interrogation in order to be able to conduct proper oversight and ensure that our government cannot shield policies that authorize practices in violation of our laws. The Judiciary Committee is an important partner in this oversight.

Section 405 of the bill establishes a new Office of Inspector General of the intelligence community to conduct independent investigations, inspections, audits and reviews on programs and activities conducted under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence. Under this new authority, the inspector general is required to submit a semiannual report to the Director of National Intelligence summarizing its activities. The amendment incorporated into S. 1494 last fall, and carried over to S. 3611, modifies the reporting provision to require the inspector general to submit reports that focus on government officials to the committees of the Senate and the House of Representatives with jurisdiction over the department that official represents.

Section 405 of the bill creates an entirely new inspector general with significant authority and responsibility in the intelligence community. That authority will implicate agencies within the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee, including the Department of Justice and components of the Department of Homeland Security. I believe this modification to the bill provides an important recognition of the Judiciary Committee's need to be involved in the investigations and activities of this new inspector general.

Another significant new provision is section 445 of the bill, Report and Assessment on Transformation of the Intelligence Capabilities of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which creates a broad new reporting requirement for the FBI. The Judiciary Committee has always had primary oversight over the FBI. As the FBI takes on more responsibility in the areas of intelligence and national security, its policies and practices in these areas must be subject to the oversight of Congress. The Intelligence Committees have particular expertise that make them an important partner in this oversight. However, it is the Judiciary Committee that has the primary legislative and oversight responsibilities over the FBI.

I am very pleased that the bill passed today contains several important improvements that I recommended to strengthen FOIA. I am particularly pleased that the bill, as amended, does not contain a broad and unnecessary exemption to FOIA's disclosure requirements for terrorist identity information. That provision was included in an earlier version of the bill, but I worked to ensure it was struck it prior to passage of S. 1494 last fall. It is not included in S. 3611, the successor to S. 1494.

No one would quibble with the notion that our government can--and should--keep some information secret to protect our national security. But, in the case of terrorist identity information, our government has successfully withheld this sensitive information under the existing FOIA exemptions for classified and law enforcement information. In addition, the many instances of mistaken identities and other errors on terrorist watchlists and ``no-fly'' lists make it clear that FOIA can be a valuable tool to help innocent Americans redress and correct mistakes on these lists.

Lastly, as a result of my negotiations with Senator Feinstein last fall, S. 3611 narrows the exemption to FOIA's search requirements for operational files information that the Nation's intelligence agencies share with the ODNI. The bill makes it clear that operational files that are already exempt from these search requirements retain this exemption under circumstances where the files are disseminated to the ODNI. This carefully crafted compromise will help ensure both effective information sharing among our intelligence agencies and the free flow of information to the American public.

I believe that S. 3611 and the managers amendment passed today recognize the value and significance of the shared jurisdiction in many areas of national security between the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees. The Judiciary Committee has long engaged in oversight and legislative activity regarding cyber threats and cybersecurity. Senator Feinstein and I have worked together in the Judiciary Committee for many years on these issues, and we both recognize the shared jurisdiction and responsibilities of the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees

with regard to oversight of cyber matters and cybersecurity.

I appreciate Senator Feinstein's cooperation in adopting these improvements. In a letter sent to me yesterday, August 3, 2010, Senator Feinstein reiterated her commitment to work with the Judiciary Committee in the area of cyber matters. I ask unanimous consent to have her August 3, 2010 letter printed in the Record. I also ask unanimous consent to print in the Record an exchange of letters between Senator Feinstein and myself dated September 15 and 16, 2009, that discussed Senate jurisdiction over the section in the bill that addresses cybersecurity oversight. In the earlier version of the bill, S. 1494, the section was numbered 340. In the new version of the bill, S. 3611, the cybersecurity oversight section is numbered 337.

As Senator Feinstein has described it, Section 337 of the bill is intended to provide a preliminary framework for executive and congressional oversight of cybersecurity programs, as defined in the section, to ensure that these programs are consistent with legal authorities, preserve reasonable expectations of privacy, and are subject to independent audit and review. Section 337 of S. 3611 creates several reporting requirements with regard to the executive and congressional oversight of cybersecurity programs. These include Presidential notifications to Congress, reports to Congress and the President from the head of a department or agency with responsibility for cybersecurity programs, in conjunction with the inspector general of that department or agency, and a joint report to Congress and the President from the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security and the inspector general of the intelligence community on the status of the sharing of cyber threat information within 1 year. I look forward to continuing to work with Senator Feinstein in the Judiciary Committee and in the Senate to ensure strong oversight and legislation with regard to cyber matters.

I am pleased the Senate today will pass the amended Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010. The progress that Senator Feinstein and I have made to improve this bill demonstrates the success we can have when we work together constructively.

Exhibit 1

U.S. Senate,

Select Committee on Intelligence,

Washington, DC, September 15, 2009.

Hon. Patrick Leahy,

Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary, Dirksen Office

Building, Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Leahy: As you know, our staffs have been in

discussions since the beginning of recess over various

provisions of S. 1494, the Intelligence Authorization Act for

Fiscal Year 2010, ordered reported from the Committee on July

22, 2009. Among the provisions at issue is Section 340,

Cybersecurity Oversight.

Section 340 is intended to provide a preliminary framework

for executive and congressional oversight of cybersecurity

programs, as defined in the section, to ensure that these

programs are consistent with legal authorities, preserve

reasonable expectations of privacy, and are subject to

independent audit and review.

Section 340 contains several reporting requirements. One

requires the President to provide certain notifications to

Congress. In addition, the head of a department or agency

with responsibility for cybersecurity programs, in

conjunction with the inspector general of that department or

agency, is to submit to Congress and the President periodic

reports on the program. Finally, the Inspector General of the

Department of Homeland Security and the Inspector General of

the Intelligence Community are jointly to submit a report to

Congress and the President on the status of the sharing of

cyber threat information within one year.

Under the provision as reported, notifications and reports

under the section are to be submitted ``to the Congress.''

Vice Chairman Bond and I have consulted with the Senate

parliamentarian to convey our recommendations for how

referrals of notifications and reports under the section

should be made.

As we have discussed before, cybersecurity is a matter of

interest to many of the committees of the Senate. Of note is

the longstanding interest in, and jurisdiction over, cyber

matters by the Judiciary Committee. This includes but is not

necessarily limited to the cybersecurity of the Justice

Department and other departments and agencies under the

Committee's jurisdiction, privacy interests of the American

people, and legal dimensions of the government's cyber

activities. Given the Judiciary Committee's role in these

matters and the expectation that reports under Section 340

will touch on one or more of the Committee's areas of

jurisdiction, it is my strong belief that documents provided

to the Congress should be provided to the Judiciary

Committee.

In addition, should the Intelligence Committee receive

reports under this section that are within the jurisdiction

of the Judiciary Committee but that are not provided to the

Judiciary Committee, I will ensure that access to those

reports is provided to Judiciary Committee members and staff

as appropriate.

Thank you for your cooperation over this issue, and other

provisions of the intelligence legislation.

Sincerely,

Dianne Feinstein,

Chairman.

Mr. President, today the Senate will pass the amended Intelligence Authorization Act for fiscal year 2010, S.1494. I appreciate the commitment of Senator Feinstein, the chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, to work with me to strengthen this important legislation. The bill the Senate has approved recognizes the shared jurisdiction of the Committee on the Judiciary, and the Select Committee on Intelligence, in several legislative areas.

The first opportunity to review this legislation arose on August 5, shortly before the Senate was scheduled to recess, and in the midst of the debate on the confirmation of Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor. At that time, I recognized several provisions in the bill that fall under the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee, as well as issues about which the committee shares an interest with the Select Committee on Intelligence. Since that time, Senator Feinstein and I, as well as our staffs, have engaged in serious negotiations concerning these provisions. We negotiated agreements regarding exemptions to the Freedom of Information Act, FOIA, as well as numerous reporting requirements, such as a significant, new requirement for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI, an agency clearly under the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee, and an important new cybersecurity oversight provision.

The amendment to the intelligence authorization bill agreed to today identifies the Judiciary Committee as a recipient of relevant reporting provisions, narrows the operational files FOIA exemption for information provided by intelligence agencies to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, ODNI, and strikes a FOIA (b)(3) exemption for terrorist identity information. Senator Feinstein has told me she is also committed to ensuring that the Judiciary Committee will receive reports required by the bill's section 340, cybersecurity oversight. I appreciate Senator Feinstein's support for these improvements.

The intelligence authorization bill includes several reporting requirements that involve areas of long-standing interest and jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee. The amended bill ensures that the Judiciary Committee is a recipient of those reports. Section 336 of the bill directs the Director of National Intelligence to provide a comprehensive report on all measures taken by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and by elements of the intelligence community to comply with the provisions of applicable law, international obligations, and executive orders relating to the detention or interrogation activities of the intelligence community. These include compliance with the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005; the Military Commissions Act of 2006; common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions; the Convention Against Torture; Executive Order 13492, relating to lawful interrogations; and Executive Order No. 13493, relating to detention policy options.

The amendment to the intelligence authorization bill modifies section 336 to ensure that to the extent that the report addresses an element of the intelligence community within the Department of Justice, it shall be submitted, along with associated material, to the Judiciary Committees of the House and Senate.

I fought for years to obtain information about the Bush administration's detention and interrogation policies and practices, and the legal advice from that administration authorizing those policies and practices. The last administration refused to give this information to Congress, instead issuing secret legal advice that misconstrued our laws and international obligations with regard to the treatment of people in our custody. Years later we found out that the administration had sanctioned cruel interrogation techniques, including torture. It is imperative that the Judiciary Committee be fully informed of the extent to which the government is complying with our laws and international treaties relating to detention and interrogation in order to be able to conduct proper oversight and ensure that our government cannot shield policies that authorize practices in violation of our laws. The Judiciary Committee is an important partner in this oversight.

Section 407 of the bill establishes a new office of inspector general of the intelligence community to conduct independent investigations, inspections, audits and reviews on programs and activities conducted under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence. Under this new authority, the inspector general is required to submit a semiannual report to the Director of National Intelligence summarizing its activities. The amendment incorporated into S.1494 modifies the reporting provision to require the inspector general to submit reports that focus on Government officials to the committees of the Senate and the House of Representatives with jurisdiction over the department that official represents.

Section 407 of the bill creates an entirely new inspector general with significant authority and responsibility in the intelligence community. That authority will implicate agencies within the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee, including the Department of Justice and components of the Department of Homeland Security. I believe this modification to the bill provides an important recognition of the Judiciary Committee's need to be involved in the investigations and activities of this new inspector general.

Another significant new provision is section 445 of the bill, report and assessment on transformation of the intelligence capabilities of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which creates a broad new reporting requirement for the FBI. The Judiciary Committee has always had primary oversight over the FBI. As the FBI takes on more responsibility in the areas of intelligence and national security, its policies and practices in these areas must be subject to the oversight of Congress. The Intelligence Committees have particular expertise that make them an important partner in this oversight. However, it is the Judiciary Committee that has the primary legislative and oversight responsibilities over the FBI.

I am very pleased that the amendment adopted today contains several

important improvements that I recommended to strengthen FOIA. I am particularly pleased that the bill, as amended, deletes a broad and unnecessary exemption to FOIA's disclosure requirements for terrorist identity information.

No one would quibble with the notion that our government can--and should--keep some information secret to protect our national security. But, in the case of terrorist identity information, our government has successfully withheld this sensitive information under the existing FOIA exemptions for classified and law enforcement information. In addition, the many instances of mistaken identities and other errors on terrorist watchlists and ``no-fly'' lists make it clear that FOIA can be a valuable tool to help innocent Americans redress and correct mistakes on these lists.

Lastly, the revised bill also narrows the exemption to FOIA's search requirements for operational files information that the Nation's intelligence agencies share with the ODNI. The bill now makes it clear that operational files that are already exempt from these search requirements retain this exemption under circumstances where the files are disseminated to the ODNI. This carefully crafted compromise will help ensure both effective information sharing among our intelligence agencies and the free flow of information to the American public.

I believe the amendment strengthens this legislation by recognizing the value and significance of the shared jurisdiction in many areas of national security between the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees. I appreciate Senator Feinstein's cooperation in adopting these improvements. In a letter sent to me today, Senator Feinstein has also committed to continuing to work with the Judiciary Committee in the area of cyber matters. I will ask to have her letter printed in the Record.

The agreement to proceed with the intelligence authorization bill today includes a commitment to ensure that the Judiciary Committee receives reports required by the bill's section 340, cybersecurity oversight. The Judiciary Committee has long engaged in oversight and legislative activity regarding cyber threats and cybersecurity. Senator Feinstein and I have worked together in the Judiciary Committee for many years on these issues, and we both recognize the shared jurisdiction and responsibilities of the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees with regard to oversight of cyber matters and cybersecurity.

As Senator Feinstein has described it, section 340 of the bill is intended to provide a preliminary framework for executive and congressional oversight of cybersecurity programs, as defined in the section, to ensure that these programs are consistent with legal authorities, preserve reasonable expectations of privacy, and are subject to independent audit and review. Section 340 of the bill creates several reporting requirements with regard to the executive and congressional oversight of cybersecurity programs. These include Presidential notifications to Congress, reports to Congress and the President from the head of a department or agency with responsibility for cybersecurity programs, in conjunction with the inspector general of that department or agency, and a joint report to Congress and the President from the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security and the inspector general of the intelligence community on the status of the sharing of cyber threat information within one year. I look forward to continuing to work with Senator Feinstein in the Judiciary Committee and in the Senate to ensure strong oversight and legislation with regard to cyber matters.

I am pleased the Senate today will pass the amended Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010. The progress that Senator Feinstein and I have made to improve this bill demonstrates the success we can have when we work together constructively.

Mr. President. I ask unanimous consent to have the letter to which I referred printed in the Record.