Press Releases
Brendan Daly/Nadeam Elshami
202-226-7616
03/14/2008
Pelosi: FISA Bill Meets Our Responsibility to Protect America While Protecting Our Civil Liberties
“I thank Mr. Conyers, the chair of the Judiciary Committee,
and Mr. Reyes, chair of the Intelligence Committee, for their leadership in
bringing this legislation to the floor.
They know, as does each and every one of us, that our primary
responsibility is to protect the American people. We take an oath of office to protect and
defend the Constitution of the
“All of us understand, also, the role that intelligence
plays in protecting our troops – force protection. That used to be our primary responsibility,
and now of course, homeland security is part of that. None of us would send our troops into harm’s
way without the intelligence to perform their mission and keep them safe. Although some have been willing to send our
men and women in uniform into harm’s way without the equipment they need to
keep them safe, we don’t make any accusations against them that they are not
patriotic Americans. We want to protect
the American people.
“As Chairman Conyers and Chairman Reyes have already pointed
out in some detail, this legislation will meet our responsibility to protect
“The President has said that our legislation will not make
“The Administration demands that Congress grants immunity to
companies for activities about which the President wants only a small number of
Members of Congress and no member of the Judicial Branch deciding any of the
currently filed lawsuits to know anything about.
“The bill before us acknowledges that immunity for the
companies may already exist under current law and allows that determination to
be decided by a judge with due protection for classified information. Not by hundreds of people who really do not
have the facts.
“Why would the Administration oppose a judicial
determination of whether the companies already have immunity? There are at least three explanations:
“First, the President knows that it was the Administration’s
incompetence in failing to follow the procedures in the statute that prevented
immunity from being conveyed – that’s one possibility. They simply didn’t do it right. Second, the Administration’s legal argument
that the surveillance requests were lawfully authorized was wrong; or third,
public reports that the surveillance activities undertaken by the companies
went far beyond anything about which any Member of Congress was notified, as is
required by the law.
“None of these alternatives is attractive, but they clearly
demonstrate why the Administration’s insistence that Congress provide
retroactive immunity has never been about national security or about concerns
for the companies; it has always been about protecting the Administration.
“As important as the issue of immunity might be, it is
chiefly important to the Administration and the telecommunications companies as
they look back to events that occurred as many as six years ago. What is truly important to the security of
our country and the protection of our Constitution going forward are the
amendments made to FISA in Title I in this bill that is on the floor today, the
so-called surveillance title of the bill.
“The bill retains three of the essential provisions of the
bill passed by the House in November and in doing so, explicitly rejects again
the heart of the President’s warrantless surveillance program. Those provisions are:
“One, a restatement that FISA remains the exclusive –means
to authorize electronic surveillance.
The President likes to think that he has the inherent authority to
survey and collect on anybody and this bill restates that FISA is the exclusive
authority. This was a point conceded to
in 1978 when the Congress of United States established the FISA law, which was
signed by the President of the United States, thereby his recognition of
Congress’ ability to make the courts the third branch of government the
exclusive authority for the collection of intelligence in the United
States.
“Second, except in emergencies, FISA court approval must
take place before surveillance begins.
But there are exceptions in case of emergencies.
“Third, a refusal to follow the Senate in excluding – this
is very important, because people are talking about the Senate bill as some
great thing - from the definition of electronic surveillance activities
historically considered to be within the definition. In other words, if they don’t want the law to
apply for a particular activity, they’ll just say it doesn’t fall into this
bill. If the Administration’s change in
the definition change was accepted, ‘FISA-derived’ information including
“The President insists that we pass the Senate bill as
is. Yet even that legislation’s chief
author—Chairman Rockefeller—agrees that many of the House provisions improve
the Senate bill.
“This legislation before us today will ensure that our
intelligence professionals have all the tools they need to protect the American
people, and the President knows it.
“This legislation will also ensure that we protect what it
means to be an American—our precious civil rights and civil liberties.
“Both goals are essential and both are achieved by this bill. I urge its passage.”