NSA Call Database - Government and Public Response

Government and Public Response

• In response, the Bush administration defended its activities, while neither specifically confirming or denying the existence of the potentially illegal program. According to the Deputy White House Press Secretary, "The intelligence activities undertaken by the United States government are lawful, necessary and required to protect Americans from terrorist attacks."
• Senator Arlen Specter has said that he will hold hearings with the telecommunications CEOs involved. The Senate Intelligence Committee is expected to question Air Force General Michael Hayden about the data-gathering during his confirmation hearings as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Hayden was in charge of the NSA from 1999 through 2005.
• Commenting on the apparent incompatibility of the NSA call database with previous assurances by President Bush, former Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich told Fox News, "I’m not going to defend the indefensible. The Bush administration has an obligation to level with the American people... I don’t think the way they’ve handled this can be defended by reasonable people."
  • Later on Meet the Press, Gingrich stated that "everything that has been done is totally legal," and he said the NSA program was defending the indefensible, "because they refuse to come out front and talk about it."
• Republican Senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News, "The idea of collecting millions or thousands of phone numbers, how does that fit into following the enemy?"
• House Republican Caucus chairwoman Deborah Pryce said, "While I support aggressively tracking al-Qaida, the administration needs to answer some tough questions about the protection of our civil liberties."
• Former Republican House Majority Leader John Boehner said, "I am concerned about what I read with regard to NSA databases of phone calls."
• Democratic senator Patrick Leahy, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said "Are you telling me that tens of millions of Americans are involved with al-Qaida? These are tens of millions of Americans who are not suspected of anything. ... Where does it stop?"
• On May 15, 2006, FCC Commissioner Copps called for the FCC to open an inquiry into the lawfulness of the disclosure of America's phone records.
• In May, 2006, Pat Robertson called the NSA wire-tapping a "tool of oppression."
• In May 2006, former majority leader Trent Lott stated "What are people worried about? What is the problem? Are you doing something you're not supposed to?"
• On May 16, 2006, both Verizon and BellSouth stated not only did they not hand over records, but that they were never contacted by the NSA in the first place.
• On June 30, 2006, Bloomberg reported the NSA "asked AT&T Inc. to help it set up a domestic call monitoring site seven months before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks," citing court papers filed June 23, 2006 by lawyers in McMurray v. Verizon Communications Inc., 06cv3650, in the Southern District of New York.