Hearing of the House Commitee on the Judiciary. Warrantless Surveillance and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Interview

HEARING OF THE HOUSE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
SUBJECT: WARRANTLESS SURVEILLANCE AND THE FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE SURVEILLANCE ACT: THE ROLE OF CHECKS AND BALANCES IN PROTECTING AMERICANS' PRIVACY RIGHTS (PART II)

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I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I'll be very quick.

Mr. Director, I just want to follow up on the chairman's questions at the outset. I don't think the chairman was asking how often you've attempted to get a warrant on an American, which I think you stated that you've done about a hundred times, but rather where you have gone up on a foreign target but have had the effect of overhearing the conversation of an American. How often has that happened? And I think you said you'd get the number back to us, but I wonder if you can tell us today -- are we talking about hundreds of conversations, thousands of conversations or tens of thousands of conversations?

MR. MCCONNELL: Sir, I simply don't know. I mean, I just don't know. We'll get the number and provide it.

REP. SCHIFF: Because I would think, as the director, you ought to know what ballpark we're talking about.

MR. MCCONNELL: I --

REP. SCHIFF: -- even if you don't know the specific number. Do you have any objection --

MR. MCCONNELL: We are not even sure we keep information in that form. It would probably take us some time to get the answer. The reason is, you're collecting information -- it's in a file -- it will roll off in a period of time. You may not even know it's in the database. That's one of the reason we're so careful about how -- who has access to that database.

REP. SCHIFF: Do you have any --

MR. : If I could --

REP. SCHIFF: If I could just -- because I don't want to take up too much of Mr. Berman's time -- do you have any objection, Mr. Director, to an amendment to the Protect America Act that would provide that when you do overhear the conversation of an American, even though you're targeting a foreigner, that you will report those conversations to the FISA Court, that the FISA Court would have a supervisory role as well as the Congress?

Since that would be done on the back end, it wouldn't provide any time obstacle or anything to the surveillance on the front end. Would you have objections to that kind of an amendment?

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