Statement Of Senator Patrick Leahy
Hearing On Protecting Our National Security From Terrorist Attacks:
A Review Of Criminal Terrorism Investigations And Prosecutions
October 21, 2003
Today’s hearing is the first in a series of
oversight hearings to review America’s progress in the fight against
terrorism. Chairman Hatch and I envision these hearings as a
bipartisan effort to review the effectiveness of our anti-terrorism
laws; to evaluate the Administration’s proposals for additional law
enforcement authority; and to assess the impact of these measures on
Americans’ privacy and civil liberties.
I expect the Attorney General to participate in
these hearings, and I am disappointed that we will not be hearing
from him today. Unlike other senior Administration officials who
regularly participate in oversight hearings, Attorney General
Ashcroft has appeared before this Committee only once this year, and
then only for a short time. This is a curious omission given his
recent acknowledgment, in a letter to me, that regular and vigorous
oversight by Congress provides an important assurance that
investigations are conducted in accordance with the law and the
Constitution.
I understand that the Attorney General is a
busy man, but he has found time to travel the country to make other
appearances, most specifically in leading a nationwide public
relations campaign attempting to blunt criticism of the USA PATRIOT
Act. Surely he can spare a few hours of his time for the Senate and
for this oversight Committee. I know that Members on both sides
have questions for him. When I chaired this Committee we made every
effort to accommodate his busy schedule, and I am confident that
Senator Hatch would do the same.
One of the focal points for this series of
hearings will be the PATRIOT Act, which Congress passed two years
ago this month, in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Since its passage,
the PATRIOT Act has raised concerns with citizens around the country
and across the political spectrum. To date, anti-PATRIOT
resolutions have been passed by more than 190 communities in 34
states.
Recently, the Justice Department dismissed the
many local government resolutions condemning the PATRIOT Act by
saying: “[H]alf are either in cities in Vermont, very small
population, or in college towns in California. It’s in a lot of the
usual enclaves where you might see nuclear free zones, or they
probably passed resolutions against the war in Iraq.”
It is unfortunate that the Justice Department
felt it appropriate to ridicule these grass-roots efforts to
participate in an important national dialogue. The opportunity to
engage in public discourse is one of the essential rights of
Americans, and I am proud that Vermont towns are among those
dedicated to thinking about and acting on these important issues.
More importantly, the concerns expressed in my home state are being
echoed by Americans in all 50 states. These communities represent
millions upon millions of Americans, not just a few
liberty-and-privacy-conscious Vermonters, as the Justice Department
has insinuated. Impugning Vermonters, dedicated librarians and
United States Senators for asking questions and raising concerns
does not advance the debate or instill public confidence in the
Ashcroft Justice Department’s use of the vast powers it wields. In
fact, it achieves the opposite.
In a democracy there will always be an inherent
tension between government power and privacy rights, and the threat
of terrorism has magnified that tension. When you overlay that with
excessive government secrecy, and the lack of cooperation and
accountability that have characterized the approach taken by this
Administration in its dealings with the Congress and the public, you
further compound the tension and the risks to our free society.
First, undue secrecy undermines the system’s built-in checks and
balances. And over time it corrodes the public’s faith that their
government is not crossing the line and treading on the rights and
freedoms of the American people.
While we have another two years before some of
the powers we granted in the PATRIOT Act expire, it is not too soon
for this Committee to take a hard look at how those powers are being
used: What is working, what is not, and what can we do better?
The PATRIOT Act has become the most visible
target of public concerns about governmental overreaching, but those
concerns extend even further, as will these hearings. The next
hearing in this series will address a broad array of civil liberties
issues, including issues relating to the 9/11 detentions that the
DOJ Inspector General raised in his excellent report earlier this
year. Later hearings will examine other issues raised by the fight
against terrorism, which I hope will include the treatment of
so-called “unlawful combatants,” information-sharing with our State
and local partners, and the pressing needs of our first responders.
Instead of the Attorney General, we will hear
today from the recent nominee to head the Criminal Division and two
U.S. Attorneys. This hearing has been in the works for some time,
and the witnesses were selected by Senator Hatch more than two weeks
ago, yet we still did not receive their testimony in a timely
fashion. I do not blame the witnesses, who I assume are busy on
substantive matters. But I am disappointed in the Administration’s
lackadaisical approach to these oversight matters. When the
Attorney General did not timely submit his testimony for a hearing
of the House Judiciary Committee in May 2002, Chairman Sensenbrenner
cancelled that hearing.
I thank our Chairman for allowing all Senators
to make a short opening statement, and suggest that he then proceed
immediately to questions so that we can use the time we have today
most effectively. That will also give us all time to read and
consider the late-arriving testimony of the Administration
representatives in due course, and to follow up as appropriate.
I hope today’s hearing sheds some light on how
the Administration is conducting the fight against terrorism. Let
me briefly highlight just a few of the many areas that I hope our
witnesses will cover.
First, I believe we need an explanation
regarding the FBI’s recruitment of language translators. I authored
a provision in the PATRIOT Act to expedite the hiring of translators
to support the FBI’s counterterrorism operations. In July of this
year -- in response to an oversight question that I had posed in
July 2002 -- the Department informed me my provision had proven
unnecessary and was never implemented. But just last week, the FBI
announced that it needed to recruit more translators. I want to
hear from our witnesses why the PATRIOT provision was not used, and
why the Department has made such inconsistent statements about the
need for translators.
Second, I am concerned that the Department of
Justice may be exaggerating its success in fighting terrorism, by
classifying cases as “terrorism” related even when they have little
or nothing to do with terrorism. According to the Transactional
Records Access Clearinghouse (“TRAC”) at Syracuse University, in
fiscal year 2003, of 616 defendants convicted in cases that the
Department classified as “terrorism” cases, only 236 were sentenced
to prison terms, with the median prison sentence being only two
months. Two months is a very short sentence for any kind of
terrorist act, which suggests that something else is really involved
in these so-called “terrorism” cases. In addition, I understand
that once people started focusing on this data, the Department of
Justice decided not to make it publicly available anymore. That is
not the way to engender confidence or understanding. Rather, it is
a foolproof way to generate suspicion and distrust.
Third, I would like to hear about the progress
in prosecuting Zacarias Moussaoui. I want to better understand why
the Department sought to dismiss all charges against this admitted
terrorist, and why it so sharply criticized the Federal judge who
instead imposed lesser sanctions for the Administration’s refusal to
follow the law and abide by court rulings.
Finally, there are areas where bipartisan
scrutiny has already led to several bills that I would hope our
witnesses today support:
- We should consider the
Grassley-Leahy-Specter “Domestic Surveillance Oversight Act.”
This bill does not in any way diminish the government’s powers,
but instead ensures the ability of the Congress and the public to
monitor the government’s use of surveillance and other
investigative tools.
- Senators Craig, Sununu, Durbin, Reid and I
are cosponsoring the “PATRIOT Oversight Restoration Act,” a bill
that would simply expand the PATRIOT Act’s existing sunset
provision to cover a number of additional provisions that focus on
privacy issues, law enforcement powers and information-gathering
tools.
- We should consider the “FBI Reform Act,”
which Senator Grassley and I introduced in July. There are
several focused reforms in the bill, one of which Director Mueller
acknowledged support for during his last appearance before the
Committee on July 23.
- We should strengthen the reserves of our
first responders, who are critical partners of the FBI in the
terrorism fight. The “First Responders Partnership Grant Act,”
which I introduced at the outset of this Congressional session,
would expand the Federal money available to our State and local
partners by between $4 billion and $5 billion a year, so that they
could fund overtime and pay for equipment, training and facility
expenses to support first responders.
Others, such as
Senator Durbin, Senator Craig and Senator Feingold, have additional
legislative proposals as well.
I look forward to
further discussion of these items, and to hearing from our witnesses
here today and from the Attorney General in the near future.
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