Also see below:     
Gonzales Suggests Legal Basis for Domestic Eavesdropping    [

    Gonzales Draws Criticism From Panel Chief
    The Associated Press

    Thursday 06 April 2006

    Washington - The Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee pointedly criticized Attorney General Alberto Gonzales Thursday for "stonewalling" by refusing to answer questions about the Bush administration's warrantless eavesdropping program.

    Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., said Gonzales was frustrating his panel's oversight of the Justice Department and the controversial surveillance by declining to provide information about how the program is reviewed inside the administration and by whom.

    "How can we discharge our oversight if, every time we ask a pointed question, we're told the program is classified?" Sensenbrenner asked Gonzales near the start of a lengthy hearing on the department's activities. "I think that ... is stonewalling."

    Gonzales did not budge, defending the eavesdropping as lawful and telling Sensenbrenner and other lawmakers on the panel that he would not discuss classified matters.

    "I do not think we are thumbing our nose at the Congress or the courts," Gonzales said in response to a question from Michigan Rep. John Conyers, the committee's senior Democrat.

    President Bush confirmed in December that the National Security Agency has been conducting the surveillance when calls and e-mails in which at least one party is outside the United States are thought to involve al-Qaida. Gonzales has been at the center of the administration's defense of the program in the face of criticism from Congress and civil liberties groups.

    Gonzales also would not discount that the president could order the NSA to listen in on purely domestic calls without first obtaining a warrant from a secret court established nearly 30 years ago to consider such issues.

    He said the administration, assuming the conversation related to al-Qaida, would have to determine if the surveillance were crucial to the nation's fight against terrorism, as authorized by Congress following the Sept. 11 attacks. "I'm not going to rule it out," Gonzales said.

    The attorney general acknowledged that there had been disagreement about the monitoring inside the administration. But he took issue with published reports that detailed some of those disputes.

    "They did not relate to the program the president disclosed," he said. "They related to something else and I can't get into that."

    In written responses to questions from Congress, the Justice Department last month would discuss disagreements among the departments' attorneys about the program or a Newsweek story about a Justice Department controversy over the program in 2004 that led to a visit from senior White House officials to then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was in a hospital at the time.

 

---

    Go to Original

    Gonzales Suggests Legal Basis for Domestic Eavesdropping
    By Eric Lichtblau
    The New York Times

    Friday 07 April 2006

    Washington - Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales suggested on Thursday for the first time that the president might have the legal authority to order wiretapping without a warrant on communications between Americans that occur exclusively within the United States.

    "I'm not going to rule it out," Mr. Gonzales said when asked about that possibility at a House Judiciary Committee hearing.

    The attorney general made his comments, which critics said reflected a broadened view of the president's authority, as President Bush offered another strong defense of his decision to authorize the National Security Agency to eavesdrop without warrants on international calls and e-mail messages to or from the United States.

    Mr. Bush, in an appearance in North Carolina, told a questioner who attacked the program that he would "absolutely not" apologize for authorizing it.

    "You can come to whatever conclusion you want" about the merits of the program," Mr. Bush said. "The conclusion is I'm not going to apologize for what I did on the terrorist surveillance program."

    At the House hearing, Mr. Gonzales faced tough questioning from Democrats and Republicans but declined to discuss many operational details.

    Representative F. James Sensenbrenner Jr., the Wisconsin Republican who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee and one of the administration's staunchest allies, accused the administration of "stonewalling."

    "Mr. Attorney General, how can we discharge our oversight responsibilities if every time we ask a pointed question, we're told that the answer is classified?" Mr. Sensenbrenner asked. "Congress has an inherent constitutional responsibility to do oversight. We are attempting to discharge those responsibilities."

    The House and Senate have conducted limited inquiries into the surveillance program, which many Democrats contend is illegal.

    Republicans on the Senate intelligence panel have agreed on measures to impose new oversight but allow wiretapping without warrants for up to 45 days.

    Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has proposed that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court have a role in ruling on the legitimacy of the program. In the past, Mr. Gonzales and the administration have avoided discussing what they consider hypothetical possibilities in the face of Democrats' accusations that Mr. Bush has asserted unbridled authority to fight terrorism.

    At the hearing, Mr. Gonzales inched closer toward acknowledging that intercepting purely domestic calls could be considered legally permissible in his view if the communications involved Al Qaeda.

    "You would look at precedent," he said. "What have previous commander in chiefs done?"

    Answering his question, he cited Woodrow Wilson's authorizing the interception of all cables to and from Europe in World War I "based upon the Constitution and his inherent role as commander in chief."

    Mr. Gonzales said he would use that legal framework to decide whether intercepting purely domestic communications without a warrant was legally permissible. He would not say whether such wiretapping has been conducted.

    The attorney general and other administration officials have said the National Security Agency eavesdropping was authorized just to monitor communications with one end outside the United States.

    Representative Adam B. Schiff, the California Democrat who raised the question with Mr. Gonzales, said the refusal to rule out purely domestic interceptions without a warrant was "very disturbing."

    The position, Mr. Schiff said, "represents a wholly unprecedented assertion of executive power."

    "No one in Congress would deny the need to tap certain calls under court order," he added. "But if the administration believes it can tap purely domestic phone calls between Americans without court approval, there is no limit to executive power. This is contrary to settled law and the most basic constitutional principles of the separation of powers."

    The Justice Department later backed away somewhat from Mr. Gonzales's statement and said his comments should not be interpreted as a change in policy.

    A department spokeswoman, Tasia Scolinos, said, "The attorney general's comments today should not be interpreted to suggest the existence or nonexistence of a domestic program or whether any such program would be lawful under the existing legal analysis."