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Analysis: Domestic Spy War Intensifies

Council on Foreign Relations

January 31, 2008
Author: Greg Bruno

As the clock runs down on a controversial domestic-spying program, a tangled legal and political battle mounts. President Bush warned Congress during his final State of the Union speech January 28 of dire consequences should the government’s wiretapping of overseas terror suspects be forced into temporary retirement on February 1. “If you don’t act by Friday, our ability to track terrorist threats would be weakened and our citizens will be in greater danger,” he said. Lawmakers on January 30 answered the call (WashPost) and approved a fifteen-day extension to amendments of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). But the controversy is unlikely to subside: critics accuse the Bush administration of fearmongering (Salon) to further its spying agenda, and say even if FISA reforms expired without action the president would still be able to conduct surveillance, albeit with court approval.

Among the thorniest unresolved issues is a call to extend retroactive immunity to U.S. companies assisting in electronic monitoring of U.S. citizens. AT&T, Verizon, and other telecom giants each face multibillion dollar lawsuits for their roles in the National Security Agency’s intelligence collection efforts. Vice President Dick Cheney said in a January 2008 address to the Heritage Foundation that amnesty is needed to keep communication companies cooperating with spy agencies. “Without liability protection for past activities to aid the government, the private sector might be extremely reluctant to comply with future requests from the government,” he said. The Democratic-majority House disagrees—they passed an updated FISA bill in November minus the immunity provision—but squabbling continues in the Senate, where lawmakers cannot reach consensus on the amnesty provision.

Read the rest of this article on the cfr.org website.

Copyright 2008 by the Council on Foreign Relations. This material is republished on GlobalSecurity.org with specific permission from the cfr.org. Reprint and republication queries for this article should be directed to cfr.org.