Key lawmaker questions value of Bush's domestic surveillance program

WASHINGTON — The House intelligence-committee chairman on Sunday questioned the value of President Bush's secret eavesdropping program, saying al-Qaida undoubtedly has changed its means of communication to avoid Washington's monitoring.

Bush said two weeks ago in his State of the Union address that the program of monitoring calls and e-mail between the United States and suspected terrorist associates overseas without a court warrant "remains essential to the security of America." But Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., suggested that the public disclosure of the program's existence in December in The New York Times has undermined its effectiveness.

"Does anyone really believe that, after 50 days of having this program on the front page of our newspapers, across talk shows across America, that al-Qaida has not changed the way that it communicates?" Hoekstra said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Since that disclosure, legal scholars and lawmakers from both parties have questioned whether Bush had the authority to conduct the surveillance without a judge's approval.

By law, a secret court, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, is designed to grant warrants for such surveillance.

Hoekstra defended the program's legal standing. He said if Democrats who were briefed on the program before it became public thought the president was breaking the law, they should have tried to stop him.

Rep. Jane Harman, the leading Democrat on the intelligence committee, said the briefings she received concerned "the operational details of the program," which she supported. "However," she added, "The briefings were not about the legal underpinnings of the program."

She said it was not until Bush spoke publicly about the classified program, after it was revealed in The New York Times, that she was free to discuss it with House staff members and constitutional lawyers.

Hoekstra and Harman appeared with two others who were among the few lawmakers to be briefed on the program before it became public: Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., and former Sen. Tom Daschle of South Dakota, who was the Senate Democratic leader.

The two Republicans — Hoekstra and Roberts — said Congress does not need to pass further legislation granting specific authority to conduct the warrentless eavesdropping because the president had authority under the resolution that lawmakers passed four days after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, authorizing him to take on al-Qaida.

Both Democrats — Harman and Daschle — said they think the program is valuable and should continue but that the law should be changed to allow it.

Material from The Washington Post is included in this report.