Lieberman Unveils Intelligence Reform Plan
September 15, 2004
By Dori Berman
WASHINGTON—Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) Wednesday unveiled legislation to reorganize the nation’s intelligence gathering operations, give budgetary power to a newly created national intelligence director and establish a National Counterterrorism Center.
The legislation, slated to be introduced next week to the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, chaired by Collins, is the result of an examination by Lieberman and Collins of the recommendations described in the 9/11 commission report.
“In its report, the 9/11 Commission indicted the status quo in America’s intelligence community and insisted on fundamental, revolutionary changes,” Lieberman said at a press conference Wednesday. “Our bill adopts the two Commission proposals which its leaders have said are the most urgent and important.”
The proposed national intelligence director would have the authority that former CIA chief George Tenet lacked, Collins said. She referred to a passage in the 9/11 commission’s report that quoted a December 1998 memo from Tenet stressing the urgency of the terror threat.
“The commission concluded that [the memo] had virtually no effect on mobilizing the CIA or the intelligence community,” she said.
President Bush endorsed giving a national intelligence director expanded budgetary authority last week.
Collins told reporters that without that expanded power, the new position would just become another level of bureaucracy. The president’s endorsement, she said, would help the momentum of the bill.
Explaining the need for the director, Lieberman compared the current state of the nation’s intelligence community to a football team with many great players, but no quarterback.
In addition to the new director position and the counterterrorism center, the commission recommended the reorganization of congressional oversight of the intelligence community. A bipartisan task force to examine the issue has been appointed by Senate leadership.
Another commission recommendation proposed in the legislation is the establishment of a Civil Liberties Board that would oversee the implementation of national security policies to ensure that the rights of citizens are protected.
One commission recommendation left out of the Senate legislation was the appointment of deputies to the national intelligence director. As laid out in the commission’s report, the deputies would run intelligence agencies within departments including the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security.
“A reasonable question to ask is where would the loyalty of those deputies be?”
Lieberman asked. “Would it be to the department they spend most of their time in, or to the national intelligence director?”
Lieberman said the intention of the legislation is to establish a strong national intelligence director position, and testimony from hearings showed that appointing deputies would blur the lines of authority, one of the problems that is present in the current intelligence system.
The legislation would put most intelligence agencies under the control of the director, but would allow the Defense Department to keep control of the Defense Intelligence Agency.
The House is also working on intelligence overhaul legislation and leaders said yesterday they hope to act on it before the November election.
