Executive Session

CONGRESSIONAL RECORD
SENATE
Sept. 22, 2004

EXECUTIVE SESSION

NOMINATION OF PORTER J. GOSS TO BE DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, in beginning my comments, I first want to commend the chairman, Senator Roberts, for the way in which he conducted the hearing. He was eminently fair. I believe I had five rounds of questions myself for the nominee, and I want to express my appreciation to the chairman for the way he conducted the hearings, and also express my thanks to Senator Rockefeller. His leadership on the committee has been invaluable to me.

I also want to commend the vice chairman for an excellent statement this afternoon, much of which I agree with, as he knows.

PORTER GOSS is a good man and a good Congressman, but his long record of supporting business-as-usual intelligence policies is not good enough to warrant his appointment as CIA Director at this dangerous hour. Mr. Goss showed that on his watch, as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, he passed on virtually every opportunity to move aggressively for reform. His commitment to public service is unquestioned, but his unwillingness to displease the powerful to force change in our intelligence community is unfortunate.

In the committee, there were three major areas that came up as we sought to evaluate the nominee. The first, as the distinguished Senator from West Virginia has talked about today, has been the issue of partisanship. The second area at which the senior Senator from Michigan, Mr. Levin, looked at some length, was the question of the nominee's ability to objectively analyze intelligence. The third was the area that I focused on, which was why the nominee has been so slow to push aggressively for intelligence reform.

I have come to the conclusion that it is possible-and we have all tried, as the Senator from West Virginia has said, to give one the benefit of the doubt in these various areas. I have come to the conclusion that I can give the nominee the benefit of the doubt on the issue of partisanship. I can give the nominee the benefit of the doubt with respect to his pledge to be objective in analyzing intelligence. But I just cannot get over the answers we were given during almost 9 hours of hearings with respect to why the nominee was so slow to be an agent for change in the intelligence community.

It is really that leadership that I find so central. I have tried, as a member of the committee, to be as bipartisan as I possibly can. We understand politics should stop at our borders. We all stand ready to put in place the policies necessary to protect America's security, but to do that we need leadership.

I and others try to be bipartisan. Senator Lott, Senator Snowe, Senator Graham, and others sought, for example, to change the way Government documents are classified. I think that is an important issue, to make the right structural changes in intelligence. But if we do not get the right information, information consistent with national security and not classified for political purposes, we are still going to have problems making reforms in the intelligence area.

I want to be bipartisan. I listened carefully to the questions that were asked in the committee, good questions by Senator Rockefeller, and I am willing to give the nominee the benefit of the doubt with respect to the partisanship issue.

But I will tell you, the answers that we were given with respect to why it took the nominee so long to push for changes in the intelligence community still leave me unconvinced. For example, at one point in our hearings the nominee told me it was difficult to get attention to the issues of intelligence on his watch. He said the reason he had not introduced legislation is that people were not focused on it; it was hard to get people's attention.

Let's think about what happened in those years when we evaluate the nominee's response on that question. PORTER GOSS was chairman of the Intelligence Committee in 1998 when al-Qaida bombed our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. He was chairman of the Intelligence Committee in 1999 when the United States was investigating allegations of Chinese theft of our nuclear materials. He was chairman of the Intelligence Committee when the USS Cole was bombed by al-Qaida in October of 2000. And, of course, he was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee when we faced 9/11.

It took him nearly 3 years to introduce reform legislation after 9/11. I believe that is not good enough. I believe a chairman of a key committee can get attention when that chairman wants to use that chairmanship as a bully pulpit to be an agent for change. I believe a chairman who is committed to intelligence reform has the chance, when he bangs his gavel, to speak out for why changes are needed.

A leader must lead. We all get election certificates, in the U.S. Congress, to try to tackle problems, important problems, but chairmen have a special opportunity. If you look at the long record-and he said the record is the record-the nominee passed on virtually every opportunity to use his bully pulpit, to use his gavel, and to work for the kind of changes that would make this country as safe as necessary.

We, all of us, understand it takes courage to rock the boat. It takes courage to be an agent for bold change. But if you want an example of an individual who did it, an individual who is a prominent Republican, you need look no further than former New Jersey Governor Tom Kean and his performance as the Chair of the 9/11 Commission. This stalwart Republican made truth his only goal. He pressed Republicans and Democrats alike to do the same. He was more successful and has already begun to engineer more change than hardly anybody thought possible in this fractured political climate. What a boon it would have been, had we had the same commitment to change on the issue of intelligence, intelligence reform, by the current nominee to head the CIA.

The current nominee had a front row seat during all those years, the years I outlined when those terrible acts of terrorism occurred, when he could have pushed for reform. Yet after weeks of going through the nominee's record and 2 full days of questioning, I am hard pressed to find anywhere-in a bill, a vote, or an inquiry-anything that demonstrates the nominee will hold people accountable, for example, rather than just going along with the status quo.

The record shows, to me, again and again, the nominee chose to play it safe rather than take the risks necessary to bring about change in the intelligence community. When I looked at Mr. Goss's record, the first question that occurred to me was could he give us some examples, some concrete examples of when he was willing to stand up, to go against the popular wisdom and even his own party to bring about change; whether he was willing to take the far less dangerous risks that we take as Congressmen and elected officials than lots of other people do, certainly those wearing the uniform.

Right now, we need somebody to head the CIA who is willing to stand up, who is willing to help this country come up with policies that leave the Cold War mentality behind-those are fit for a very different kind of threat-and to hold himself and others accountable.

Mr. Goss has a long, distinguished career as a Member of Congress. I know him personally. I served with him in the other body. It would be hard to find a more decent individual. I will say there are very few jobs in the Government of our country at which I don't think PORTER GOSS would do a good job. But being effective here on Capitol Hill and in other parts of the Government is not where I set the bar for this key appointment. The bar ought to be set very high because we know we have great challenges ahead of us.

For example, I have come to the conclusion that on the intelligence reform legislation we, hopefully, will be dealing with on the floor of the Senate shortly, it may not be the structural problems that are our greatest challenge in improving intelligence and making our country safer. I think there is more to it than moving the boxes around on an organizational chart with respect to intelligence. I think this is as much a people problem as a structural problem. If you are going to solve those problems, in the area of people, human interaction, you have to have leadership, you have to have somebody who is willing to stick his or her neck out.

That is where I set the bar. I think the long record and the questions I asked established beyond a doubt that PORTER GOSS is a good man. He has been a good legislator. But there simply is no evidence that he is willing to rock the boat in the intelligence community, which I think is necessary to make this country as safe as it needs to be.

For that reason I join the distinguished vice chairman of our committee in opposing the nomination. Like the vice chairman, I am very hopeful I will be proved wrong. As I said, on the issue of partisanship, on the issue of objectivity of analysis, I give the nominee the benefit of the doubt. With respect to his willingness to fight aggressively for bold change, I remain unconvinced. For that reason I will oppose the nominee.

I yield the floor.