Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012

Mr. President, I am very pleased to rise today in support of the Senate's passage of the Intelligence Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2012. I understand that the House of Representatives intends to consider this legislation on the suspension calendar later this week, so it should be enacted prior to the end of this session.

This will be the third time in less than 15 months that the Congress will enact an intelligence authorization bill--including bills for fiscal years 2010, 2011, and 2012--after a 6 year hiatus in passing such legislation. What this means is that Congress, through the Senate and House Intelligence Committees, is restoring oversight over the intelligence community and fulfilling our responsibility to thoroughly examine intelligence policies and budgets.

Unlike the last two authorization bills, this bill was completed contemporaneously with, instead of after, the appropriations process that funds intelligence efforts. The classified annex to this legislation authorizes appropriations for intelligence activities and has helped guide the work of the appropriations committees as they considered intelligence spending. The days when the intelligence community can bypass the intelligence committees and deal solely with the appropriations committees are over.

Since receiving the President's budget request for the intelligence community in February, the Intelligence Committee has recognized that the massive increase in intelligence spending over the past decade has come to an end. Our original bill, reported to the Senate in August of this year, reduced intelligence spending below the President's request. Since then, we have worked closely with the House Intelligence Committee, the Senate Appropriations Committee, and the executive branch to reflect the spending reductions set in the Budget Control Act of 2011. The legislation we are approving today keeps funding for intelligence essentially flat from fiscal year 2011, representing the a meaningful reduction from the President's request.

As we look to 2013, many more difficult decisions will need to be made to make further reductions to intelligence spending. It is my belief that real reductions in intelligence spending can be accomplished without sacrificing capability, but this will require a rigorous review and the executive branch being more forthcoming than it has been to date about where it believes cuts are possible.

Of course, the bill also provides significant legislative provisions to give the intelligence community the authorities and flexibilities it needs to continue protecting our national security and providing policymakers the information they need to make foreign policy and security decisions; and other provisions for the effective and appropriate functioning of our intelligence apparatus.

I note that passage of the last intelligence authorization bill occurred shortly after the strike leading to the death of Usama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Since then, the intelligence community has had continued success in tracking and removing terrorist threats to the United States. Senior leaders and commanders of al-Qaida, including all of its affiliate groups as well as militant organizations involved in the Afghan war, have been removed from the fight, and terrorist plots and plotting have been disrupted. Among them, a plot to kill the Saudi Ambassador to the United States was thwarted due to the skillful and cooperative efforts of the FBI, DEA, CIA, and others.

Intelligence has factored into significant policy decisions and U.S. actions, including with respect to interdicting the proliferation of weapons, setting economic sanctions, protecting ISAF forces in Afghanistan, blocking cyber attacks against our government and certain critical infrastructure companies, and contributing to the NATO effort in Libya.

It is my hope that the provisions in this bill will continue to aid the intelligence community as it conducts its missions; ensure better stewardship of taxpayer dollars; and support its thousands of civilians and military employees.

Among other things, this bill includes: A section that provides for burial allowances for intelligence employees killed in the line of duty, similar to those for members of the U.S. military; New procurement authorities that enable intelligence agencies to protect against supply chain risk to information technologies; a measure authorizing new accounts at the Department of Treasury that will enable defense intelligence agencies to become financially auditable; Provisions that strengthen congressional oversight of the transfer of detainees from Guantanamo Bay; a section that will improve the accuracy of intelligence community cost estimates; and Provisions that provide the Director of National Intelligence with needed personnel management authorities.

As I noted, the bill contains a 275-page classified schedule and annex that authorizes intelligence funding and implements the committee's oversight findings over the past year. That annex is available to all Senators in the intelligence committee's offices.

Mr. President, let me note my sincere appreciation for the close collaboration of Senator Chambliss, the vice chairman of the committee, throughout the legislative process. He and his staff--in particular Martha Scott Poindexter and Jacqueline Russell--have continued the bipartisan approach that the committee followed in the last Congress, and we have together agreed to every provision in the bill.

As can be imagined, it has taken enormous effort to produce a third bill in such a short time frame. I sincerely thank the efforts of the staff to review the President's requested funding levels and legislative provisions, to draft legislation, and to negotiate a final product. In particular, I thank Lorenzo Goco, the Deputy Staff Director who has overseen the legislative efforts, Michael Davidson, the general counsel of the Senate Intelligence Committee until this past Labor Day, and Christine Healey, who has carried the load of the legislative work throughout and who replaced Mr. Davidson as general counsel. I also extend my appreciation for the work of Eric Losick and Mike Buchwald, majority counsel on the Committee, and Jack Livingston and Kathleen Rice, the minority counsel.

Similarly, the Committee's budget staff has worked diligently and expertly in their preparation of the classified annex to this bill and in working with intelligence agencies to understand and guide their efforts. I thank the committee's budget director, Peggy Evans, and the budget staff through this period: Hayden Milberg, Randy Bookout, Andrew Kerr, John Dickas, Paul Matulic, Matt Pollard, Amy Hopkins, Jamal Ware, Iram Ali, Jeffrey Howard, Andy Grotto, Jim Smythers, Brian Miller, Eric Chapman, John Maguire, Tyler Stephens, Evan Gottesman, Brian Walsh, Ryan Tully, and Christian Cook.

I also appreciate the work and relationship with Chairman Rogers and Ranking Member Ruppersberger of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. The version of the legislation approved today builds on the House legislation, and our two committees have consulted closely throughout this process. We held a joint open hearing on the tenth anniversary of the September 11, 2011, attacks and I look forward to continuing to work together next year to enact the fiscal year 2013 intelligence authorization bill.

Let me also note my appreciation for two other Senate committees. The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense has closely followed our authorizations as it drafted its appropriations bill. This underscores the work done in our bill, and limits to a minimum the cases where the authorization and appropriations levels do not match.

We have also worked over the past week with the Senate Armed Services Committee to include language in the classified annex to this bill concerning the Military Intelligence Program and a military construction program authorized for the National Security

Agency. The Armed Services Committee and the Intelligence Committee both exercise jurisdiction over military construction projects with intelligence funding; in this instance, the two committees have both included authorizations for the High Performance Computing Center II, and have jointly agreed to the language included in this annex.

Finally, Mr. President, I note that while there is no committee report or conference report associated with the text that we are approving today, the Intelligence Committee issued a report to accompany the bill it reported to the Senate in August. As the legislation has changed since House passage of its authorization bill and consideration today of this amendment, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a section-by-section analysis of the legislation so as to provide for the legislative history needed to explain the authors' intent and better clarify the effects of the provisions included.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I would like to briefly address S. 1458, the intelligence authorization bill for fiscal year 2012, which has now been reported by the Select Committee on Intelligence. I know that the chair and vice chair of the committee, Senator Feinstein and Senator Chambliss, along with their respective staff, have worked hard on this bill, and I support nearly every provision in it. However, I strongly disagree with the decision to include a 3-year extension of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 in this bill, and it is my intention to object to any request to pass this bill by unanimous consent. Consistent with my own policy and Senate rules, I am announcing my intention to object by placing a notice in the Congressional Record.

As most of my colleagues remember, Congress passed the FISA Amendments Act in 2008 in an effort to give the government new authorities to conduct surveillance of foreigners outside the United States. The bill contained an expiration date of December 2012, and the purpose of this expiration date was to force Members of Congress to come back in a few years and examine whether these new authorities had been interpreted and implemented as intended.

I believe that Congress has not yet adequately examined this issue and that there are important questions that need to be answered before the FISA Amendments Act is given a long-term extension.

The central section of the FISA Amendments Act, the part that is now section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act itself, specifically stated that it was intended to address foreigners outside the United States, and it even required the Attorney General to develop procedures designed to make sure that any individuals targeted with this new authority are believed to be outside the United States. So one of the central questions that Congress needs to ask is, Are these procedures working as intended? Are they keeping the communications of law-abiding Americans from being swept up under this authority that was designed to apply to foreigners?

I wanted to know the answer to this question, so Senator Udall of Colorado and I wrote to the Director of National Intelligence if it was possible to count or estimate the number of people inside

the United States whose communications had been reviewed under section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act. The response we got was prompt and candid. The response said ``it is not reasonably possible to identify the number of people located in the United States whose communications may have been reviewed under the authority'' of the FISA Amendments Act.

I should be clear that I do not plan to accept this response as a final answer. I understand that it may be difficult to come up with an exact count of the number of people in the United States whose communications have been reviewed, but I believe Congress at least needs to obtain an estimate of this number so that people can understand the actual impact of the FISA Amendments Act on the privacy of law-abiding Americans.

During the markup of the intelligence authorization bill, Senator Udall of Colorado and I proposed an amendment that would have directed the inspector general of the Department of Justice to review the implementation of the FISA Amendments Act and attempt to estimate how many people inside the United States have had their communications reviewed under this law since it was passed 3 years ago. Our amendment also would have directed the inspector general to examine other important aspects of the FISA Amendments Act, including the problem of recurring compliance violations, and report back to Congress within 1 year.

I regret that the amendment that Senator Udall of Colorado and I offered was not adopted, but I obviously plan to keep trying to get more information about the effects of this law. I hope that I will find out that no law-abiding Americans, or at least very few, have had their communications reviewed by government agencies as a result of this law, but I believe that I have a responsibility to get concrete facts rather than just hope that this is not the case. And I believe that it would be not be responsible for the Senate to pass a multiyear extension of the FISA Amendments Act until I and others who have concerns have had our questions answered.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to amend this bill, and I am hopeful that they will be willing to modify it to address the concerns I have raised. In the meantime, I should be clear that it is my intention to object to any request to pass the current version of S. 1458 by unanimous consent.

Mr. President, I rise to join Chairman Feinstein in thanking my colleagues for their support of the fiscal year 2012 Intelligence Authorization Act. Over the past several months, the committee has worked hard to resolve the final details of the bill and concerns raised by other committees and individual Members. The end result of this effort is a solid bill that ensures vigorous congressional oversight and provides needed authorities to the intelligence community.

Of course, the vast majority of what the committee authorized is classified, so I cannot discuss specifics. I can say that the classified annex is designed to improve the operations of the intelligence community--from counterterrorism and counterproliferation to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and everything in between.

This bill also implements fiscal discipline. Difficult economic times demand austerity, but cuts in this bill are specific and targeted to eliminate waste while preserving the critical work the intelligence community does to protect our country.

In the unclassified area--and one of great importance to me--we reached an agreeable compromise with the Administration that gives the committee the information we need about the transfer of Guantanamo Bay detainees. As the recidivism rate among former detainees rises over 27 percent, it is critical that the committee have full insight into the transfer and resettlement process. The vast majority of detainees are free when they are transferred, and this committee needs to know whether the countries charged with monitoring them are capable and willing to do so. Several provisions in this bill will help the committee do that.

The bill also addresses concerns from other committees with national security interests and from the House. As we go forward, I hope the committees of the Senate will do a better job of making sure that committees with oversight of national security issues get the information they need, without automatic objections based on perceived jurisdictional lines. Too often, the intelligence committee includes other committees on receipt of reports or other products, but does not get the same treatment in return. That's just not good for oversight or for fulfilling our responsibility to the American people.

I am also pleased that we were able to reach reasonable solutions for authorities requested by the intelligence community. The bill allows for the reimbursement of burial expenses for certain government employees who are killed as the result of hostile or terrorist activities or die in connection with a risky intelligence activity. In these difficult financial times, we worked hard to make sure that the provision is in line with benefits for the families of fallen soldiers and with the funeral costs generally paid by ordinary Americans. We also ensured that individuals in the same agency, like the FBI, are entitled to receive the same reimbursement. The bill also refines the administration of the CIA's foreign language proficiency requirements and allows for more flexible personnel management by the Director of National Intelligence.

I thank Chairman Feinstein for her hard work and leadership in getting this bill through the Senate. I also thank the committee staff for once again showing their dedication and commitment to protecting the national security of this country.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to Calendar No. 161.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Feinstein substitute amendment, which is at the desk, be agreed to; the bill, as amended, be agreed to; the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table, with no further intervening action or debate; and any statements related to the bill be printed in the Record.