Former House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte Says Hearings on CIA Bulk Collection Program Is “Urgent and Essential”

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Yesterday’s revelation that the CIA is conducting a warrantless bulk collection program of Americans’ data outside of any statutory justification elicited the following response from Bob Goodlatte, PPSA senior policy advisor and former Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. Goodlatte said:
 
Yesterday, Senators Ron Wyden and Martin Heinrich revealed that a classified CIA bulk collection program has been conducted “entirely outside the statutory framework that Congress and the public believe govern this collection, and without any of the judicial, congressional or even executive branch oversight that comes with FISA collection.”
 
These revelations raise troubling questions that make investigatory hearings by the House and Senate Judiciary Committees urgent and essential. The committees should ask:
 

• Under what legal framework, if any, did the CIA operate this covert, bulk-data collection program? Does the CIA believe that Executive Order 12333 alone – which is not a statute – is sufficient to authorize spying on the American people?

 

• What kind of records and personal data of U.S. citizens did the CIA collect?

 

• How were these records stored, maintained and governed? If the program included U.S. person queries, what were the parameters and rules governing those searches?

 

• Why did the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence have to learn about the existence of this apparently large CIA program from a PCLOB[1] report?

 
In her confirmation hearings, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines promised “transparency” in explaining the legal basis for every surveillance program. She should be required to do so now in Congressional testimony.


[1] Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board