Republicans Kill Request for Spy Program Inquiry

WASHINGTON —  Republican members of the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday defeated a Democratic push to investigate a domestic espionage operation authorized by President Bush, but pledged to increase scrutiny of the controversial program through a newly created subcommittee.

The developments enraged Democrats but delivered mixed results for the White House, which avoided a full-scale investigation of the spying operation, according to Senate Republicans, by agreeing to provide detailed briefings on the program to a larger number of lawmakers.

Emerging from a closed-door session in which Democrats lost two party-line votes, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), the vice chairman of the committee, said the outcome pushed the panel “further into irrelevancy” and reflected the influence of the Bush administration.

“The committee is, to put it bluntly, basically under the control of the White House,” said Rockefeller, who had campaigned for a committee investigation and argued that all members of the panel ought to have full access to information on the program.

Republicans rejected Rockefeller’s view and said that the deal reached Tuesday required the White House to back down from its long-standing refusal to provide information on the domestic surveillance operation to more than a handful of lawmakers.

“We should fight the enemy, not each other,” said Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), the chairman of the committee.

Roberts said Republicans also were working with the White House on legislation that would give the government clearer authority to monitor Americans’ international phone calls and e-mails, but would place some new controls on such eavesdropping.

The deal announced Tuesday would create a subcommittee with seven members -- four Republicans and three Democrats -- that would get regular briefings on the domestic surveillance activities of the National Security Agency, which eavesdrops on calls and e-mail traffic around the world.

Roberts and other Republicans said the White House had agreed to provide members of the new subcommittee extensive access, equivalent to that previously restricted to the chairman and vice chairman.

Since the spying program’s inception in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, the White House had allowed only eight members of Congress -- the majority leaders in each house and the ranking members of the two intelligence committees -- to attend intermittent briefings on the program at the White House.

The House Intelligence Committee took a similar step last week, saying it would designate one of its existing subcommittees to examine and hold regular hearings on the operation, which involves intercepting the communications of Americans or others in the United States without first obtaining a court order.

The White House has defended the operation, saying it has been a crucial tool in fighting terrorism and that it only allows eavesdropping on individuals who are in contact with people overseas suspected of having ties to the Al Qaeda terrorist network.

But critics have argued that Bush had no authority to start the program, and that it violates 1970s statutes that placed strict limits on domestic spying operations in response to abuses during the Nixon administration.

Bush’s program has prompted an outcry even among some Republicans, who have questioned its legality and asked whether it was necessary to bypass a system that allows domestic eavesdropping as long as the government obtains the permission of a special foreign-intelligence court.

Several prominent Republican skeptics of the program -- including Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine -- had warned they might favor a congressional investigation, but voted against doing so Tuesday to back the creation of the subcommittee instead.

Rockefeller said that giving seven members of the committee expanded access to information on the program left eight remaining members of panel in the dark.

He asked how they could be effective in considering new legislation on the program when they would not have access to basic information about it, including how many phone calls and e-mails had been intercepted without warrants and how many people in the U.S. had been subject to such surveillance.

Nevertheless, Republicans said they would move forward with crafting legislation explicitly authorizing the spying program. The GOP approach centers on a proposal from Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) that would allow the government to place a suspect under surveillance for as many as 45 days without a warrant.

The legislation would require the administration to seek a warrant once a suspect had been identified or to explain to Congress why a warrant was not needed.

DeWine said that, having spoken earlier in the day with Vice President Dick Cheney, he believed that the White House was open to his bill. He said he thought Bush had the legal authority to initiate the spying program, but that it should be specifically authorized and monitored by Congress.

“My feeling was that an investigation was not what was needed,” DeWine said. “What was needed was oversight.”

A senior Republican aide on the Intelligence Committee said the new subcommittee probably would meet soon, and that the White House had offered to provide a full-scale briefing to its members. Roberts said Republicans on the committee would include himself, DeWine, Sens. Orrin G. Hatch of Utah and Christopher S. Bond of Missouri.

Democrats have yet to select which of their members will serve on the subcommittee.

A Democratic committee aide said that members probably would participate on the panel despite their votes against its creation.