White House to let committee leaders see surveillance docs

The White House will allow Senate Judiciary Committee leaders to see documents on the Bush administration’s secret surveillance program in an effort to win their support for legal immunity for telecommunications firms that allegedly participated in the program.

{mosads}The concession attempts to break a long impasse between Democrats and the White House over whether Congress should be allowed to inspect confidential documents that could explain why telephone companies need retroactive protections from lawsuits.

But Democrats and a key Republican signaled Thursday that the Judiciary panel should have access to the documents before voting on a bill that would provide immunity and new oversight of warrantless surveillance.

“I would like to know what happened before I absolve anyone from liability from the law,” said Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), a panel member. “I can’t cast an informed vote on [the bill] until I know the circumstances.”

In a telephone conversation Thursday morning, White House counsel Fred Fielding told Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) that he and ranking Republican Arlen Specter (Pa.) could see relevant documents before they consider a bill to overhaul the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

The White House has provided the documents to the Senate Intelligence Committee, which last week approved a FISA bill 13-2 and gave retroactive immunity to firms that allegedly participated in the program after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The measure has been referred to Judiciary, but no date for a markup has been set yet.

Judiciary panel Democrats said they would not promise to support immunity even if the White House turns over all the documents. A controversy erupted this week after the White House suggested it gave the Intelligence Committee documents only because the panel’s leaders said they would support liability protections for telephone companies. Intelligence Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) rejected that suggestion.

According to Senate officials, the White House has not said whether the rest of the Judiciary Committee or Senate leadership may see the documents. The White House also has not specified which documents the committee leaders could examine, or whether they would see the same ones provided to the Intelligence Committee.

“What we’re essentially dealing with here is a constitutional issue, and that really is Judiciary Committee business — we really have primacy on that,” said Specter, who expected that the White House would eventually allow the full panel to see the papers.

Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, would not specify which documents the senators could review. The offer was made to Leahy and Specter to let them “review material that would be helpful in legislating on the issue of extending liability protection” to the businesses in question. “It’s essential that a FISA reauthorization bill contain strong liability protections.”

Telephone companies face about 40 lawsuits from plaintiffs who accuse them of giving private information to the government. The Bush administration is trying to kill those suits by arguing that the companies acted in the interest of national security.

Critics say that if telephone companies and the administration did nothing illegal, they should not be absolved from litigation.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) called the White House’s decision to provide the documents a “breakthrough,” but added, “the Judiciary Committee is going to have to work this out on their own.” Reid wants to bring the bill to the Senate floor before the end of the year.

Several Republicans would defend the White House if it refuses to give documents to the full committee. “I believe that one can decide this question of retroactive liability without necessarily having access to all of that information,” said Senate Republican Conference Chairman Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), a Judiciary panel member.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said, “The important thing here is to protect the country … I don’t think that has anything to do with turning over documents.”