Date: 2008-01-24
Speaker: HARRY REID (democrat)
Chamber: S

for bringing the FISA Amendments Act to the floor as one of our first items of business this year. I wish to thank my colleague and friend from the Senate Intelligence Committee. Senator ROCKEFELLER.. Though we may disagree on some aspects of this bill. he has been a real leader on an issue of great complexity. Last August. Congress responded to the administrations request to approve foreign surveillance legislation on an expedited basis. Remember. we didnt come to this issue because the administration felt they needed to deal us into the picture. We came to this issue because the New York Times finally published an article and told us about this warrantless surveillance that was going on all across America for years. surveillance that was not approved by Congress and was clearly not allowed by law but continued by this administration with impunity until they were caught with their hands in the cookie jar by the New York Times. Then they came to Congress and said: Well. why dont you write a law. Can we help you write a law? After 9/11. I can remember Senator ROCKEFELLER. Senator LEAHY. Senator SPECTER. and so many others who rose to the occasion and said: We will come together on a bipartisan basis to keep our country safe. We lost 3.000 innocent people. We dont want that to ever happen again. We passed the PATRIOT Act. It wasnt perfect. but it was bipartisan. It had a sunset built into it. We tried to give this Government the tools to keep America safe. There wasnt a lot of grandstanding and speechifying. We did our job. Then what happened? The Bush administration decided. in so many different aspects of this war on terrorism. to deal Congress and the American people out of the picture from that point forward. We heard rumors about secret programs. and a handful of Members were briefed. I guess. I wasnt one of them. Then. it wasnt until the New York Times told the whole story that we were kind of drawn into this situation. where we are trying to write a law to approve a course of conduct which the administration was undertaking. at least to some degree. without even consulting or conferring with Congress in its constitutional capacity. The Senate Intelligence Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee have held a lot of hearings. They have debated how to write this law and voted on a lot of amendments. We are now facing the reality that the Protect America Act. which was passed a short time ago. will expire next Friday. February 1. Under any circumstances. it would be difficult for the Senate to pass a bill of this complexity. reconcile our differences with the House. and get it all wrapped up in a week. But the President has made it clear he is not going to sign this bill unless it includes an amnesty for telephone companies that cooperated with the administrations warrantless surveillance program. This is a difficult. controversial issue many Members feel very strongly about. I am one of them. The President insists that an amnesty provision for telephone companies be included. and I think that is going to make it impossible for us to meet the February 1 deadline. Senator REID. the majority leader. has asked for a 30day extension of the Protect America Act. Lets continue the current law for 30 days. Lets try to work out our differences. Lets do this in a responsible way. Senator MCCONNELL on the Republican side objectedobjected to carrying on the current law for 30 days while we tried to work out our differences. That objection speaks volumes. Even though he opposed the Protect America Act. the majority leader I think was acting in good faith and taking the sensible course of action: Lets try to work these things out and not punish anybody in the process. The current law would stay in effect for another 30 days. The Republican Senate leadership. MITCH MCCONNELL. said no. Well. that - is unfortunate. The spokesperson for the White House said on Tuesday: The Protect America Act expires in just 10 days. yet after nearly 6 months of delay. Congress still has not taken the necessary action to keep our Nation safe. For the sake of our national security. Congress must act now. So said the White House 2 days ago. I cant follow this logic. On the one hand. the White House claims we face grave national security threats if this program expires. and on the other hand. when Senator RED tries to extend the program for 30 days. the Republican leadership objects. I am sorry. but that doesnt follow. It is worth recalling what brought us to this point. It is difficult to believe it. has been over 6 years since the terrorists struck our country on 9/11. I will never forget that terrible day. and most Americans will not either. And we will never forget what happened afterwards when Congress came together and tried to respond and make our country safe. Sadly. today Osama bin Laden is still on the loose. and alQaida is still around and may be growing in size. I wish the administration had continued the spirit of bipartisanship of the PATRIOT Act. They would have had the full support of Congress and the American people. We showed that with the passage of the PATRIOT Act. But even as we were debating that important law. the administration was secretly implementing torture and surveillance policies totally inconsistent with the values of our Nation. They didnt ask Congress to approve the warrantless wiretapping of innocent Americans or torture techniques such as waterboarding. Instead. they based their policies on the extreme view of some in the administration that the President. as Commander in Chief. was not bound by the law. They discarded the Geneva Conventions after decades of America saying that was a significant underpinning of our relationship with the civilized world. They rejected it. They called it obsolete. the Geneva Conventions. They opened Guantanamo. which has become an international embarrassment. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell has joined so many others in saying: Close this embarrassment. Yet they continue. The Justice Departments infamous torture memo narrowly redefined torture as limited only to pain equivalent to organ failure or death. Senator JOHN MCCAIN. a man who was a prisoner of war during Vietnam for years and years. spoke out and led a bipartisan fight to establish standards when it comes to the treatment of prisoners. I was happy to join him ozn a bill that had more than 90 votes. a strong bipartisan sentiment. a bill which sadly was watered down by a signing statement from this President. and I am afraidthough we may never knowI am afraid it has been ignored at many levels by this administration. We still fight the Taliban and alQaida in Afghanistan. and while we are doing it. the administration has launched a misleading propaganda campaign leading perhaps to the greatest foreign policy blunder in American history: the war in Iraq. It is worth noting that in a new report issued this week. the Center for Public Integrity concluded: President George W. Bush and seven of his administrations top officials. including Vice President CHENEY. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. made at least 935 false statements in the two years following September 11. 2001. about the national security threat posed by Saddam Husseins Iraq. An exhaustive examination of the record shows that the statements were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and in the process led the Nation to war under decidedly false pretenses. Is there any more grievous sin in a democracy than for leaders at the highest level to mislead the people of a Democratic Nation into a war with such tragic consequences? Almost 4.000 of our best and bravestinnocent. hardworking. dedicated. and patriotic soldiershave given their lives. Countless thousands have been injured because we were misled into a war by this administration. The administration brooked no dissent from their misleading campaign for war or their misguided counterterrorism policies. If anyone raised an objection. they were branded as soft on terrorism. Who can forget John Ashcroft. our former Attorney General. blaming critics of the administration for spreading "phantoms of lost liberty" and warning "your tactics only aid terrorists"? Time and again. the administration and their allies pressured Congress to consider controversial proposals immediately before elections. Oh. that is when all the warning bells went off and the threat level colors were changed. We were told there was a threat on the way. and how were. we to come to any other conclusion if we didnt see the evidence? What a coincidence that most of those warnings came right before an election. It was Karl Roves playbook and the administration ran that play over and over and over again. In 2002. the administration insisted Congress must vote to authorize the war in Iraq before the election or our security would be at risk. Why? White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card explained that "from a marketing point of view" that was the right time to "introduce new products." In 2004. the administration and its Republican allies in Congress claimed it was imperative to reauthorize the PATRIOT Act before the election or our security would be at risk. This despite the fact it didnt expire until December 31. 2005. Congress chose this date for the express purpose of depoliticizing this debate. For years. the administration insisted the President had unilateral authority to detain enemy combatants and try them in military commissions. Again and again our Supreme Court rejected the administrations arguments. Suddenly. shortly before the 2006 election. the administration changed course. insisting that Congress must vote to authorize military commissions or our security would be at risk. In fact. the administrations bill included amnesty for administration officials who had authorized illegal torture techniques. How will history judge us. granting amnesty to those who engaged in torture? It is more than a year since Congress passed the Military Commissions Act. Despite their claims of urgency. the administration has failed to bring a single terrorist. to trial. In the 2006 election. the American people took a stand and rejected the politics and policies of fear and they rejected this administrations scare tactics. One would hope the administration would have learned a lesson. But in 2008. another election year has arrived and. unfortunately. here we go again with an administration continuing to stake out divisive positions on terrorism. The administration claimed Attorney General Mukasey would turn a new page at the Department of Justice. but he has refused to say even now whether torture techniques known as waterboarding are illegal. During his confirmation hearing. Judge Mukasey promised to review the administrations classified interrogation techniques and assess their legality. It has been 2 months since then and yesterday I wrote to the Attorney General to remind him about that commitment. He has had ample time to study this issue. Yesterday. the administration announced they were going to renominate Steven Bradbury to be head of the Office of Legal Counsel. This is the office that issues binding legal opinions for the executive branch. including having issued the infamous torture memo. I have repeatedly urged President Bush to withdraw this nomination of Mr. Bradbury because of his involvement in authorizing the administrations controversial interrogation and surveillance policies. Now. the administration claims our security is at risk in this election year because Congress is allowing the Protect America Act to expire. even though Senator REID 2 days ago tried to extend it for a month. and the Republican leadership objected. Well. no surprise. Yesterday. Vice President CHENEY weighed in. He gave a speech praising the administrations counterterrorism efforts. He ignored the lessons of the last 6 years. He praised Guantanamo Bay. even though his President has called for closing it. and he praised what he called the CIAs "tougher interrogation program." Well. there is a phrase that is loaded. He claimed the CIAs interrogation techniques comply with our treaty obligations. although the militarys top lawyers and others say they violate the Geneva Convention. He said Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. the alleged mastermind of 9/11. had been subjected to the CIAs. "tougher" techniques. But the Vice President neglected to mention that 6 years after 9/11. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the other 9/11 planners still have not been put to trial. Some experts say it will be impossible to convict him because he was subjected to waterboarding and other torture techniques. The Vice President urged Congress to pass FISA legislation. Quoting President Bush. he said: The lessons of September 11 have become dimmer and dimmer in some peoples minds. Mr. Vice President. the American people havent forgotten 9/11. and we never will. We also have not forgotten that Osama bin Laden is still free and the resources needed to track him down were diverted to a war in Iraq. We have not forgotten that the war in Iraq has cost our Nation billions and. tragically. the lives of almost 4.000. We have not forgotten that instead of working with Congress to prosecute the war on terrorism in a bipartisan fashion that respects American values. this administration chose to go it alone. We will never. ever forget the blood. sweat. and tears shed by countless American heroes. who fight even as we speak to defend what makes America unique inthe world. They fight not to defend any race. religion. or ethnic group. they fight to defend a valuethe value upon which our country was founded. We are a nation of laws. not mennot this President. not any President. In his speech yesterday. the Vice President noted: The terrorists waging war against this country dont fight according to the rules of warfare. or international law. or moral standards. or basic humanity. That is true. but America is a lot better than the terrorists. Ironically. the Vice President also noted: This cause is bigger than the quarrels of party and agendas of politicians. Well. that is true as well. I only wish the Vice President and the administration would have heeded his own words and stopped politicizing so many national security issues. I urge my colleagues to reject thepolitics of fear and reject the scare tactics of t14is administration. Support the Judiciary Committee substitute. support the majority leaders request for a 1month extension in the Protect America Act. We can give the Government the power it needs to protect us. and we can still uphold the rule of law and protect the precious liberties of the American people. I yield the floor.