Making Further Coninuing Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2003

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from West Virginia, who really is a role model for so many of us. I thank him.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today to discuss the provisions in the omnibus spending bill, adopted unanimously by the Senate earlier, that will protect the privacy and civil liberties of each and every law-abiding American citizen.

I am going to discuss this over the next few minutes. I see the distinguished chairman of the full committee, Senator Stevens, in the Chamber. Before I begin my remarks, I wish to express my appreciation to the chairman of the Appropriations
Committee. He and his staff have been so gracious and so kind with respect to this issue.

The program I am going to discuss, the Total Information Awareness Program, is the most far-reaching and most expansive program of surveillance ever proposed. Senator Stevens and Senator Inouye, in particular, with the help of Senator Byrd and Senator Feinstein, and Senator Grassley, colleagues on both sides of the aisle, worked very closely with me.

But we simply would not have this amendment in the legislation, it would not be bipartisan, if Senator Stevens had not been working with us. Because he is in the Chamber, I particularly thank my colleague for all his help.

Mr. President, and colleagues, the amendment I am going to discuss tonight would prohibit spending for technology research and development in the Total Information Awareness Program, or TIA, unless the Department of Defense reports to the Congress on its plans for the technology.

The provision also establishes proper congressional oversight of this surveillance program by requiring explicit congressional approval for deployment of any Total Information Awareness technology that would be used to spy on U.S. citizens on U.S. soil.

The Defense Department itself has had a virtual database—and I will quote—that was described as "a new kind of extremely large, omnimedia, virtually centralized and semantically rich information repository." In my mind, such a novel and broadly proposed program—a program that has fingers snaking into so many areas of Americans' lives—is a textbook case of a program that needs vigorous congressional oversight.

In recent days, the Department of Defense and the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, or DARPA, have announced the formation of two oversight boards for the TIA Program—one within the Total Information Awareness Program and another Federal advisory board. In my view, this is a positive development. It indicates that they understand the growing concern of the American people about the Total Information Awareness Program.

But I am very pleased that Chairman STEVENS and the conferees shared my view, and that is that the establishment of these panels in no way reduces the need for congressional oversight of the Total Information Awareness Program. The conferees understood that these oversight boards, while useful, are not an argument for abdicating the responsibility of the Congress on this issue.

As I mentioned, this has been a bipartisan effort with Senators Feinstein and Reid—the distinguished Senator from Nevada is in the Chamber, Mr. Reid—who have been very helpful. Suffice it to say, not one Member of Congress—no one in the Senate, no one in the other body, Democrat or Republican—has disagreed with the proposition of our amendment, and that is that it is the responsibility—indeed, the duty—of this Congress to insist on oversight of the Total Information Awareness Program. Not one Senator said: Look, Congress does not need to put brakes on the most far-reaching Government surveillance effort ever proposed.

On the contrary, what Congress said was: We are going to insist that this program is not going to be allowed to grow unchecked and unaccountable. In fact, it is the duty of the Congress to protect the civil liberties and privacy of the people we represent. The call for strong safeguards has come through loud and clear, and that call has been recognized in the conference.

One publication in my home State, the Newport News-Times, put it very well. I will quote it. That publication said:
Just visiting the web site of what is affectionately billed as [the Total Information Awareness Program] is a trip into a future we hope not to meet. If our government still believes in the sanctity of the constitution this week, let's hope for the President's signature.

All across the Nation, Americans have said that while a vigorous response to terror is necessary, a system designed to spy on Americans in America is not. It is not only unnecessary, it is contrary to the freedoms that the war on terror aims to protect.

The total information awareness concept requires keeping track of individuals and understanding how they fit into models. For instance, does a seemingly innocent individual conduct himself or herself according to a pattern that terrorists have exhibited in the past?

To find out whether any current U.S. citizens fit the model of a terrorist living among us, the Total Information Awareness Program would develop a way to integrate the databases that already track our daily lives—bank records, online purchases, and travel plans, for instance. Once integrated, these disparate databases would serve as one giant repository of information on most or all of the computer-linked transactions an individual makes. Then you run the models, then you make a judgment of who looks like a terrorist. TIA's technology would give any Federal agency the capability to develop risk profiles for millions of Americans as they look for questionable conduct.

When I first heard about this program—I am sure there are many others who came to think this as well—when you hear this initially, you say, this sounds like a good idea. If you snoop on everybody all the time, you are more likely to spot a few criminal someones at the moment they are up to no good. But the fact is, the police can't just stop someone on the street and frisk them for no reason. Current privacy law is supposed to prohibit private companies and the Government from rummaging through your online records.

Unfortunately—and this is what you learn when you look at the total information proposal in depth—as it stands, the Total Information Awareness Program would use technology to pick regular Americans up by the ankles and shake them to see if anything funny falls out.

Now, I understand that terrorists are not going to hang a shingle outside their hideaways announcing they have set up shop. They are not technological simpletons. And I know, as a member of the Intelligence Committee, that extraordinary times such as this call for extraordinary measures to track down these terrorists. I do not take a back seat to anyone with respect to tracking down terrorists.

I believe one of the most important things I have been able to do as a Member of this body is to write the Terrorist Identification Classification System, a bipartisan effort, that became law in the last session, that allows us, on an ongoing basis, to watchdog terrorists, the Mohammed Attas of the world. But there is a clear line between something that allows for tracking individuals where there is a known track record of terrorist activity—suspicious activity linked to terrorism—and, in effect, standing by while the Government shines an indiscriminate spotlight into the private lives and dealings of law-abiding Americans in this country on their own soil.

It is a question of striking a balance. The Terrorist Identification Classification System is an appropriate approach for the Government to take in seeking to weed out terrorism.

The Total Information Awareness Program is over the line. It is invading the civil liberties of law-abiding Americans on U.S. soil. That is why the conferees have wisely chosen to impose checks on it. The intention of the Total Information Awareness Program and those who support it is undoubtedly to protect the America that we love. But the reality is that the program as proposed encroaches on the freedoms that make us love America in the first place.

Millions of Americans understand that. They have made it clear that they don't want this program to move forward unchecked and unaccountable, and that is why there has been such an outcry about it.

A few weeks ago I stood with a coalition in a room not far from this sacred Chamber that does not flock together all that often: Americans for Tax Reform, the Eagle Forum two groups that are certainly conservative by anybody's calculus stood with the American Civil Liberties Union and a variety of groups that would be considered liberal, as they supported efforts to put vigorous oversight in place over this program. Suffice it to say, in my time in the Congress, I have never seen a program that has generated more ideological concern across the political spectrum. We have seen Democrats, Republicans, liberals, and conservatives all saying this is a program that warrants vigorous oversight and scrutiny by elected officials.

Just because the administration has promised in recent days to institute oversight panels and to not use their awesome power for nefarious purposes, does not mean that future leaders would not abuse this program. So what we have said is that we are not going to let this program move forward without first ensuring permanent safeguards and protections that without them would threaten Americans not just today but many years in the future.

Some who advocate this program will say that the concerns of Members of Congress and others are overblown. Some say the program will not do what I described and it doesn't threaten the privacy of American citizens in the way that first appears. I hope that is the case. If that is the case, if in fact the Total Information Awareness Program does not threaten the civil liberties and privacy rights of the American people, then the folks over at the Defense Department need to come to the Congress and make that clear.

They need to do what they have not done to date, and that is to explain more about what this program will do and how it will do it.

The fact is, this body is in the dark about the Total Information Awareness Program, the most expansive and far-reaching surveillance program ever proposed. Congress has not been informed as to what safeguards and constitutional protections would be in place when this program goes forward. Therefore, my view is this Congress has no choice but to pursue answers and explanations before allowing the program to proceed. That is what our amendment to the omnibus spending bill does, and that is what the conferees have wisely chosen to do.

My view is that these are reasonable provisions. The amendment calls on the Department of Defense to explain in a report to be delivered to the Congress within 90 days what technology they intend to develop and what they intend to do with it. Then the amendment further states that when any technology is developed for this program, it may not be developed without the express approval of the Congress. If the Total Information Awareness Program is something that is less invasive or smaller in scope or different than I have described, then the administration will have an opportunity to tell us.
This amendment does not prevent those who support the program as initially outlined to have the chance to come back and show why additional threats warrant additional action. What this amendment does is ensure that if this program moves forward, it does so in a fashion that is sensitive to American freedoms, sensitive to constitutional protections and safeguards, while still ensuring that our country can fight terrorism.

Finally, it all comes down to how we come forward and address a special task. What we must do now is to be vigilant, to make sure we are doing what is necessary to fight terrorism, but not approve actions or condone actions that could compromise the bedrock of this Nation—our Constitution.

I thank my colleagues, particularly Senators Stevens, Inouye, Feinstein, Grassley, Reid, and others, who said repeatedly that Congress should not shirk its obligation. The conferees who were appointed to reconcile this spending bill had a unique opportunity to defend the Constitution and the United States. That is what we are elected to do. That is what we get election certificates for. They answered that call. For that, I offer the thanks of Oregonians and all Americans for whom civil liberties remain so special and precious tonight.

I yield the floor.