bobbyw24
12-16-2009, 06:43 AM
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has rejected a Senate plan to include amendments to the Patriot Act in a larger Pentagon funding bill covering the soaring cost of the war in Afghanistan, arguing that to do so would lead to a “revolt on the left,” according to Democratic insiders.
Pelosi’s decision, announced at a closed-door leadership meeting Monday, has forced Democrats to go with a backup plan of extending the Patriot Act until early next year, essentially punting the controversial issue into 2010, when a broader agreement with the Senate can be struck. The vote is now scheduled to take place early next year.
Pelosi’s position was supported by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). Hoyer noted that neither the House nor the Senate had passed its own revised version of the surveillance bill and objected to including it in the defense package.
“We’ll be here,” Conyers joked, meaning the House would be in session in February, when the 60-day extension of the Patriot Act will expire. “We’ll have plenty of time to do it.”
Both the House and the Senate Judiciary committees have passed new versions of the law, extending its authority until 2013, but the two chambers have not been able to reach a compromise agreement for final action. There are technical differences between the two bills, the biggest one being treatment of national security letters, the highly controversial investigative practice used by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies in terrorism probes.
Senate Democrats, led by Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy and Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, had made an appeal to their House counterparts, through Hoyer, to include the Senate committee’s version of extending the surveillance legislation in the $626 billion defense spending bill.
The defense package is already seen as the “last train leaving the station” for must-pass legislation this year: It includes an increase in the federal debt limit, a Democratic “jobs bill” and insurance subsidies for unemployed workers, among other items.
But Pelosi would have none of it, telling her colleagues that the Democratic base across the country is already upset about President Barack Obama’s decision to escalate U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan.
Pelosi and other party leaders are also concerned about an “intensity” gap between the Democratic and Republican voters heading into the midterm elections, and with health care reform stalled in the Senate for weeks — and likely to be watered down to the point where some progressives may refuse to support it — the speaker wants to avoid another fight between Democrats and their supporters.
The Patriot Act, formally known as the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act, was passed in 2001 after the Sept. 11 attacks. It vastly expanded the authority of intelligence and law enforcement agencies to spy on alleged terrorists, both in the United States and abroad. The bill was reauthorized in 2005.
But several provisions within the Patriot Act are expiring at the end of this year, including those dealing with “lone wolf” terrorists, roving wiretaps and what business records can be sought during a terrorism investigation.
Leahy and Feinstein wanted House Democratic leaders to accept their version of the surveillance legislation and made an appeal to include it in the defense spending package to be taken up later this week, but Pelosi refused.
Pelosi aides declined to comment for this story.
Kenneth Wainstein, a former Justice Department official who supports reauthorizing the Patriot Act, believes Democrats will do so in 2010 but expects some sharp political fights around the issue.
“This is sort of déjà vu all over again for what happened in 2005,” said Wainstein, now a partner at the law firm O’Melveny & Myers. Congress “had a strong debate and kind of kicked it off for a couple months, but it ended up getting reauthorized.”
Wainstein noted that the Obama dministration has “strongly supported” renewing the surveillance legislation for four more years.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1209/30649.html
Pelosi’s decision, announced at a closed-door leadership meeting Monday, has forced Democrats to go with a backup plan of extending the Patriot Act until early next year, essentially punting the controversial issue into 2010, when a broader agreement with the Senate can be struck. The vote is now scheduled to take place early next year.
Pelosi’s position was supported by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). Hoyer noted that neither the House nor the Senate had passed its own revised version of the surveillance bill and objected to including it in the defense package.
“We’ll be here,” Conyers joked, meaning the House would be in session in February, when the 60-day extension of the Patriot Act will expire. “We’ll have plenty of time to do it.”
Both the House and the Senate Judiciary committees have passed new versions of the law, extending its authority until 2013, but the two chambers have not been able to reach a compromise agreement for final action. There are technical differences between the two bills, the biggest one being treatment of national security letters, the highly controversial investigative practice used by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies in terrorism probes.
Senate Democrats, led by Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy and Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, had made an appeal to their House counterparts, through Hoyer, to include the Senate committee’s version of extending the surveillance legislation in the $626 billion defense spending bill.
The defense package is already seen as the “last train leaving the station” for must-pass legislation this year: It includes an increase in the federal debt limit, a Democratic “jobs bill” and insurance subsidies for unemployed workers, among other items.
But Pelosi would have none of it, telling her colleagues that the Democratic base across the country is already upset about President Barack Obama’s decision to escalate U.S. military involvement in Afghanistan.
Pelosi and other party leaders are also concerned about an “intensity” gap between the Democratic and Republican voters heading into the midterm elections, and with health care reform stalled in the Senate for weeks — and likely to be watered down to the point where some progressives may refuse to support it — the speaker wants to avoid another fight between Democrats and their supporters.
The Patriot Act, formally known as the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act, was passed in 2001 after the Sept. 11 attacks. It vastly expanded the authority of intelligence and law enforcement agencies to spy on alleged terrorists, both in the United States and abroad. The bill was reauthorized in 2005.
But several provisions within the Patriot Act are expiring at the end of this year, including those dealing with “lone wolf” terrorists, roving wiretaps and what business records can be sought during a terrorism investigation.
Leahy and Feinstein wanted House Democratic leaders to accept their version of the surveillance legislation and made an appeal to include it in the defense spending package to be taken up later this week, but Pelosi refused.
Pelosi aides declined to comment for this story.
Kenneth Wainstein, a former Justice Department official who supports reauthorizing the Patriot Act, believes Democrats will do so in 2010 but expects some sharp political fights around the issue.
“This is sort of déjà vu all over again for what happened in 2005,” said Wainstein, now a partner at the law firm O’Melveny & Myers. Congress “had a strong debate and kind of kicked it off for a couple months, but it ended up getting reauthorized.”
Wainstein noted that the Obama dministration has “strongly supported” renewing the surveillance legislation for four more years.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1209/30649.html