Pete Hoekstra

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton).

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield 3 minutes to my colleague from the State of Michigan (Mr. Rogers), a member of the Intelligence Committee.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. At this time I yield 3 minutes to my colleague from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt), a member of the Intelligence Committee.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. I thank my colleague for yielding. I think they are absolutely right, we need to take a look at this in the bigger context. We have to set the stage for how we got to this point. It's September 12, 2001. The President is meeting with his advisers. They're trying to identify exactly what this threat is from al Qaeda, how serious is this threat, what other activities or attacks might they be planning against the United States. And the President says: I need my intelligence and military folks to get the answers to these kinds of questions. Tell me what the threat is and tell me what the tools are that I need to implement to keep America safe. They come back with a series of recommendations, saying here's what we know, here's what we don't know about the threat. They come back and say, here are the different options that are available to us to get the information that might be able to answer some of these questions. The President and his leadership team consider the various options. They say, you know, we need to bring Congress into this to take a look at exactly what tools we're going to implement and make sure that we do this in a bipartisan basis and we do it in a basis that is consistent with American values and American law. On October 25, the President and Vice President convene a meeting. The President's national security team comes up and they say, here's the tool that perhaps can be used. The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee is there. The Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee is there. The ranking minority member of HPSCI is at the meeting. She's accompanied by the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. That's right. Back in October of 2001, the Speaker of the House was briefed on the various tools that could be used to keep America safe. November 14, 2\1/2\ weeks later, the chairman of HPSCI, the ranking member, yeah, that's right, the current Speaker of the House, was briefed on the tools that were available and could be used, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, the vice chairman. March of 2002, the chairman of HPSCI, the ranking minority member of HPSCI, that's right, the current Speaker of the House, was in the meeting. June of 2002, the chairman of HPSCI, the ranking minority member of HPSCI, that's right, again, the current Speaker of the House is brought in, is briefed on this program, and said this is the tool that we want to use, this is the tool that we need to use to keep America safe. Four times in about 9 months, the current Speaker of the House was briefed on this program, about what the tool was, the kind of information that we were expecting to get and, after a period of time, the information that we were collecting that would keep America safe. I was not in those meetings. I was not one of the select group of people that was informed. You would think that they would say, what are the civil liberty implications of this? You know, how are we using these tools? Where does it fit within the legal framework of America to keep us safe? And who's going to be working on this program? Who do we need to partner with? And there might have been certain companies or individuals that were identified as saying, these folks are going to partner with us and have partnered with us because they can help provide us with the information that will keep us safe and do it in a legal way. Since that time, and since this program became public, there has been all kinds of accusations out there. But the bottom line is, there may have been people, there may have been companies and corporations that, when the President and Congress went to them and said, we need your help to keep America safe, they may have stepped up to the plate and provided us with the assistance that we knew that on a bipartisan basis the executive branch and Congress said, we need to do this, and we need to do it in a way that protects civil liberties, and we need to do it in a way that is legal and consistent within the law. And the bottom line is, this is dealt with in the Senate bill. They recognized the help. They don't throw these people under the bus after we asked them to help.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Madam Speaker, what we try to do in the Intelligence Committee is to define the threat that is out there. We know that radical jihadists, al Qaeda, that it is a real threat. We attempt to provide our intelligence community with the tools that are necessary to give us, as policymakers, and others the information that is necessary to keep America safe. And at least some of us are in the business of prevention, making sure that there is not another successful attack against the United States; others are in the mode of, well, let another attack, if it happens, we want to be in a position to prosecute. When we get down to FISA, I went through this earlier, October 25, 2001; November 14, 2001; March 5, 2002; June 12, 2002, Members of the House of Representatives were briefed on this program. Our Speaker of the House was briefed on this program, understanding what the program was, or hopefully understanding or at least asking the questions to get understanding about what the program was, what it intended to do, and the kind of information it was going to get, and the legal boundaries, the legal ramifications, and who was participating in these programs. Now what they want to do and some want to do is throw these companies that were the Good Samaritans that decided they were going to help us, just throw them under the bus, even though, on a bipartisan basis, the legislative branch and the executive branch asked these folks and decided that these were the things that needed to be done. The impact of this is this is having a chilling effect on all of those individuals and corporations that, from time to time, are being asked to help to keep us safe. It is like saying we saw what you did to these other folks. We are not going to be next. We are going to have to wield a fiduciary responsibility to our shareholders. Again, it is the tradition and the experience and background of what some want to do to the intelligence community. Under President Clinton, there were massive cuts in the intelligence community. We devastated the community through the Deutch doctrine, where we cut back on human assets. And now we are doing it again. We won't give the intelligence community the tools that they need. We focus on global warming and we focus on partisan investigations. That will not keep America safe. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, while I will not oppose this bill, even though it has not gone through regular order in the committee process, I continue to have serious reservations about further putting off the critical issue of FISA modernization. I also have significant concern with the failure of the majority to ensure a long-term and effective solution to the critical problem of ensuring that our intelligence community has the tools that it needs to detect and protect potential terrorists. Last August, Congress acted on an overwhelming bipartisan basis after months of prodding to pass the Protect America Act and close significant intelligence gaps against foreign terrorists in foreign countries. The failure to clarify the authorities of our intelligence professionals on a long-term basis had clearly jeopardized America's ability to detect and prevent potential terrorist attacks and to effectively collect intelligence on foreign adversaries. The Protect America Act expires on Friday, February 1. This temporary extension will now push that date to February 15. While elements of surveillance under the Protect America Act could have temporarily continued without an extension, the failure to act permanently on the lapsing authorities still ultimately threatens the capabilities of the intelligence community to react with speed and agility to new threats and changing circumstances. We cannot continue to make excuses. We cannot continue to avoid our responsibility to deal with this vital issue. National security should not be on a week-to-week lease. I think both the President and Members on our side of the aisle have made clear that our patience with further delays to this vital legislation will be extremely limited. Democrats have failed to do their job on this critical national security issue, even after Speaker Pelosi boasted last August that they would act as soon as possible. Their partisanship on this issue clearly has failed. A bipartisan Senate solution, acceptable to the President, has been available for weeks, but has been held up by liberal activists over the issue of retroactive liability for third parties who may have helped the government to detect potential terrorists. Madam Speaker, columnist Stuart Taylor recently pointed out that holding the private sector hostage to ideological extremism is a ``risky game.'' It is a risky game for our national security and may chill cooperation in future emergencies. He wrote: ``Most Americans would want the telecoms to say yes without hesitation. But the telecoms would have reason to say no, or delay for a few dangerous days to consult their lawyers, if liberals get their way in a battle currently raging in Congress.'' [From the National Journal, Jan, 19, 2008] Holding Telecoms Hostage: A Risky Game (By Stuart Taylor, Jr.) Suppose that the next big terrorist attack on our country comes two weeks after a new Democratic president has taken office. Simultaneous suicide bombings devastate 20 schools and shopping malls around the country, killing 1,500 people. The intelligence agencies believe that at least 20 more trained jihadists, including American citizens, are in the United States planning follow-up attacks. The president is told that the best hope of stopping a second wave of attacks is to immediately wiretap as many calls and e-mails as possible from and to every private citizen who has been to Pakistan or Afghanistan since 1999. These hundreds of domestic wiretaps, with neither warrants nor probable cause to suspect any individual of terrorist ties might well violate the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The president nonetheless asks the major telephone companies to place the taps for 30 days while the administration seeks congressional approval. He or she also assures the telecoms in writing that the new attorney general has advised that the Constitution empowers the president to temporarily override FISA during such an emergency--a controversial theory never tested in court. Most Americans would want the telecoms to say yes without hesitation. But the telecoms would have reason to say no--or delay for a few dangerous days to consult their lawyers--if liberals and libertarians get their way in a battle currently raging in Congress. The issue is whether to immunize these same telecoms retroactively, as President Bush and a bipartisan majority of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (including Chairman Jay Rockefeller IV) urge, from liability for having said yes to Bush's warrantless surveillance program during the unprecedented national crisis precipitated by the 9/11 attacks. The telecoms face more than 40 class actions seeking hundreds of billions of dollars in damages for their roles in the Bush program, which they agreed to after being assured that the attorney general had deemed the program lawful. Allowing this litigation to continue would, as a group of highly respected former Justice Department officials wrote in a joint letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee, ``produce perverse incentives that risk damage to our national security,'' because ``both telecommunications carriers and other corporations in the future will think twice before assisting any agency of the intelligence community seeking information.'' This particular group includes Jack Goldsmith, James Comey, Patrick Philbin, and John Ashcroft. They (especially the first three) won bipartisan applause for leading a rebellion in 2004 against overreaching claims of power by Bush, who chose to secretly override FISA not just for a few weeks but for years. ``Given our experiences,'' the former officials wrote, ``we can certainly understand that reasonable people may question and wish to probe the legal bases for such intelligence activities.'' But the proper forum is the congressional oversight process, they asserted, not ``a public lawsuit against private companies that were asked to assist their nation.'' Such leading Democrats as former Sen. Bob Kerrey, former Rep. (and 9/11 commission Co-Chair) Lee Hamilton, and former Attorney General Benjamin Civiletti have also called for immunizing the telecoms. On the other hand, People for the American Way, like other liberal groups, argues that immunity would ``protect telecoms that knowingly violated law.'' But the telecoms did not violate the law--even if Bush did--according to an October 26, 2007, Senate Intelligence Committee report urging adoption of the immunity proposal as part of an important bill updating FISA. The committee, after forcing the administration to show investigators the relevant presidential and Justice Department documents, found that the record showed that the telecoms ``acted on a good-faith belief that the president's program, and their assistance, was lawful.'' Courts have for centuries seen such a good-faith belief as grounds for immunizing from lawsuits private parties that heed government officials' requests for help in protecting public safety, especially in emergencies. And, in fact, hardly anyone in Congress thinks that the telecoms should (or will) be forced to pay huge damages to the plaintiffs, who after all have suffered no real harm. So why are some senators, including Patrick Leahy, the Senate Judiciary Committee's senior Democrat, fighting the immunity proposal? The real reasons are election-year pressure from liberal groups and the hope that the lawsuits will force public disclosure of information embarrassing to the Bush Administration. Leahy said in a press release that he opposed giving retroactive immunity to the telecoms because that would reduce their incentives to protect privacy and ``would eliminate the courts as a check on the illegality of the warrantless wiretapping of Americans that the administration secretly engaged in for almost six years.'' Leahy may well be right that some aspects of the highly classified wiretapping program were illegal. Indeed, Goldsmith, who took over the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in late 2003 and later touched off the above- mentioned rebellion, has publicly called the still-secret OLC surveillance memos that he inherited a ``legal mess.'' In my own view, Bush's decision to secretly override FISA for a time immediately after 9/11 was probably a lawful exercise of his war powers. But his legal rationale became weaker and weaker when he continued to override the law for months and years without seeking congressional approval. It is one thing to say that the president has inherent power to disregard an outdated law during an emergency in which immediate action might save many lives. It is something else to say that the president can secretly continue to disregard that law for several years without ever seeking to amend it. (See my 1/28/06 column.) But doubts about the legality of Bush's actions are no justification for holding hostage telecoms that relied on the administration's assurances of legality and were in no position to second-guess its assertions that the surveillance program was essential to national security. Not, that is, unless we want to risk that the telecoms, credit card companies, banks, airlines, hospitals, and other private companies--whose cooperation is essential to finding terrorists before they strike--will balk or delay when the next president seeks their help in an emergency. And to keep things in perspective, let's remember that even if Bush did violate the law, the terrorist groups targeted by his surveillance program have taken thousands of American lives; that the program itself has apparently caused no serious harm to anyone (except terrorists); and that no evidence exists that Bush or anyone else has ever made any improper use of any intercepted communications. Opponents of immunity say that the telecoms have nothing to fear in court if they can show that they acted lawfully. And it does seem most unlikely that the telecoms would ultimately lose; the lawsuits face huge obstacles, including the state secrets privilege and doubts about the plaintiffs' standing to sue, as well as the strong evidence that the telecoms acted lawfully. But even a remote risk of massive liability for doing the right thing in the past might deter some from doing the right thing in the future. And in the vast, interminable, unpredictable, often perverse meat grinder that high-stakes litigation has become in this country, victory in court would come only after many years of expensive legal battles, uncertainty, downward pressure on stock prices, and publicity damaging to the telecoms' international business interests. This prospect might drive them to accept a nuisance settlement that would yield millions of dollars for the plaintiffs' lawyers and very little for anyone else. Indeed, that's what many plaintiffs' lawyers are hoping for. Some senators and others have proposed ways to relieve the telecoms of monetary liability while keeping the litigation alive to force a healthy public airing of information about what Bush and his aides did. One such proposal would have the government cover any damage awards; another would place a very low cap on any damages; a third would ask the FISA court to decide whether the telecoms broke the law. Such expedients would be better than no protection at all. But they would not give the telecoms the finality and the relief from litigation costs that they want and deserve. In any event, it seems unlikely that any kind of litigation against the telecoms will yield much new information about what Bush and his aides did. The main reason is that any such evidence is probably inextricably intertwined with operational details of the surveillance, which are highly (and properly) classified. And lawsuits against the government, which would be unaffected by immunizing the telecoms, would be a more logical vehicle for exposing whatever can properly be exposed. But the bottom line is that a remote chance of exposing any Bush misconduct is simply not a good enough reason to run even a small risk of losing potentially lifesaving intelligence. And it's simply unfair to hold hostage private companies that thought they were helping to save lives and did nothing wrong. Partisan political points and the nonexistent rights of radical jihadists shouldn't be more important than giving the most effective tools to the intelligence community to detect and prevent attacks. As soon as the Senate passes this comprehensive bipartisan bill, the House should consider it immediately in order to send a responsible bill to the President as quickly as possible. There is bipartisan agreement that Congress must act immediately to ensure a long-term effective solution that empowers intelligence community professionals to act with speed and agility against foreign targets, provides retroactive liability protection for third parties who may have assisted the government after 9/11, and ensures that court orders will continue to be required for any surveillance targeting Americans. We should stop the bipartisan obstructionism and move forward with permanent legislation to fully ensure the protection of the American people and their civil rights.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the founders, administrators, staff and supporters of Mercy Hospital Cadillac as they celebrate the 100th anniversary of the hospital's public dedication. Madam Speaker, Mercy Hospital Cadillac has helped to ensure that the local community has remained healthy and productive since 1908. Mr. and Mrs. Delos F. and Esther Diggins started construction on a home for the sick in 1907 and entrusted it to the Sisters of Mercy in 1908. It admitted its first patient on January 15, 1908, and it was dedicated to its purpose by a reception to the public on January 20, 1908. It will be rededicated to its purpose during a public celebration on Sunday, January 20, 2008. From 1908 to 1934 Mercy Hospital conducted a nursing program titled the ``Mercy Hospital School of Nursing,'' which prepared young women for careers as skilled nurses. In 1952 the Mercy School of Practical Nursing was founded, and it educated 1,115 students before closing in 1985. It was ranked first or second by the Michigan Nursing Board in its last 16 years. The hospital is currently engaged in an $11 million capital campaign to modernize its facilities and invest in new technologies, which so far has provided it with the means to construct a 1,800-square-foot Obstretrical Unit, a new emergency department and a new radiology department. The initiative will build upon the hospital's successes and ensure that it has the best equipment, expertise and infrastructure. Mercy Hospital Cadillac provides health care services to more than 60,000 residents across four counties, and with more than 600 employees is one of the area's largest employers. Madam Speaker, Mercy Hospital Cadillac has contributed greatly to its community by continuing the legacy of Mr. and Mrs. Diggins and is deserving of the recognition of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 2\1/2\ minutes to my colleague from Alabama (Mr. Everett).

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield myself 2 minutes. As I said earlier, Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the conference report on the 2008 intelligence authorization bill. I think that this report does move us in the wrong direction and sets some of the wrong priorities. It rejects the bipartisan approach for congressional authorization of the intelligence community at a time when we really do need to be working together. There were efforts to do this on a bipartisan basis. The end result of the product is that it is not a bipartisan bill. As my colleague from Arizona just stated, last week we had an overwhelming vote to remove earmarks from a national security bill. It went to conference. All the earmarks were maintained in the bill. When we were at conference, my colleague from the Armed Services Committee Duncan Hunter wanted to share his concerns about the bill. Ranking Member Hunter was denied an opportunity to speak at the conference. It is why today Duncan Hunter, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, is opposed to this intelligence bill. At a time when intelligence and defense ought to be integrated and seamless, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee is opposed to this bill. One of the strategies that the President outlined in his reform for the intelligence community was to increase HUMINT, to significantly increase the size of the HUMINT individuals, people collecting human intelligence, put us on a glide path to significantly increase that critical asset. This bill falls far short of funding that glide path that I thought we had agreed upon on a bipartisan basis, saying if we are going to be effective, we need to have more human intelligence. For these and other reasons, I oppose this intelligence bill. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield myself 2 minutes. As we continue to talk about the various weaknesses in this bill, let me highlight a few more. The report fails to provide for long-term authorities to streamline the surveillance of foreign terrorist targets, foreign countries. We need this capability to detect and prevent potential attacks to the United States. It has been talked a little bit about that this bill prohibits torture. Torture is already prohibited. The insinuation is that the Members of Congress who were briefed on the interrogation methods back in 2002, 2003, as they were briefed by the administration, that these Members signed off on interrogation methods that constituted torture. I don't believe that the current Speaker of the House signed off on those types of methods. The current Speaker of the House was one of the people that was briefed back in 2002 and 2003, along with other Members. Congress participated fully and had the opportunity to review the interrogation methods. As we capture individuals and decide to determine exactly what information, I don't think we should treat them as outlined in the Army Field Manual. These are not normal enemy combatants, they don't wear a uniform, and we shouldn't be applying military rules to the intelligence community. We talked about priorities. The report on Iran perhaps last week was a significant improvement over the National Intelligence Estimates that we had gotten from the community in previous years. We hope it was better. The one in 2005 the community now says was totally wrong. The conclusions they reached were very, very different. We need to improve our intelligence capabilities. What this report says is one of the key National Intelligence Estimates that we need to develop over the next year is on global warming. We've got lots more important targets and resources. Number one is rebuilding the capability of actually doing estimates and doing assessments before we start moving on to those targets. As we improve that process, let's focus on hard targets, not global warming, which is being discussed in just about every other committee on the Hill today. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Yes, I am, in its current form.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to my colleague from New York (Mr. McHugh), a member of the committee.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, at this time I'd like to yield 3 minutes to my colleague from Texas (Mr. Thornberry).

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, at this time, I yield myself 2 minutes. Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the conference report today. I'm disappointed. I do compliment the chairman in an effort to move in a bipartisan direction. I think it's something that both he and I feel is essential, that at a time of risk, whether we're facing radical jihadists or whether we're facing the threat from China, North Korea, Iran, or other threats around the globe, it would be to the betterment of the country if we could reach a position on a bipartisan basis where we could come to the floor in support of a reauthorization or an authorization of the intelligence community. I can't do that today. I don't believe that this bill moves us in the direction that we need to go. Earlier, a colleague talked a little bit about interrogation methods and these types of things. One of the problems that has happened over the last number of years, it's talked about in the editorial that my colleague from Texas referenced, the administration on a bipartisan basis reaching out to Congress, briefing Members of Congress on various programs that they felt were essential to keeping America safe and actually have kept the homeland safe ever since 9/11, have enabled us to put together the strategies and the tactics that have ensured that we have not been attacked again. The problem is these programs have leaked out, whether it's from the community, whether it's perhaps from Congress, or wherever they have leaked out, even though Congress has been involved in the process and has reviewed these processes at their inception. These Members who were briefed and at one time said, yeah, we support these programs, have moved away from them and now that they're public said, well, yeah, we never had all the information; there's nothing that we could do about that. These programs need to be done in secret. There are problems with this bill. I will detail more of these as we go through. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes. As we talk about this authorization bill, I think it is also important to talk about it in the larger context in terms of some of the other things that are going on that I believe are weakening our ability to effectively combat the threat from radical jihadists. What are some of these things? Policies that are being advocated by individuals on the other side who are committed to defeating terrorism. I just think they have the wrong strategy. Terrorist phone calls cannot be monitored without court warrants even when all parties are outside of the United States or if the lives of American soldiers are at risk. They want to provide habeas corpus rights for foreign terrorists. Terrorists when captured overseas shall have the right to challenge their captivity in U.S. courts. The right of terrorists to incarceration in the United States. Foreign terrorists being held in facilities outside the United States, including Guantanamo Bay, will be removed from detention abroad and brought into American communities, ending the distinction between lawful versus unlawful combatants. The United States henceforth will recognize al Qaeda terrorists as legitimate combatants and grant them the rights of lawful combatants under the Geneva Conventions. Terrorists shall be afforded due process, attorneys, and protection from self-incrimination. Terrorists will also be protected from enhanced interrogation, even when they have information on pending terrorist attacks. In terms of priorities, funds shall be diverted from tough antiterrorism intelligence programs targeted at apprehending and killing terrorists through intelligence analysis in connection against global warming because some folks from the other side may have implied or said that individuals join terrorist groups not because of radical Islam or hatred of the United States, but because they are unhappy about rising global temperatures and sea levels. Extend Fourth Amendment rights barring unreasonable search and seizures to terrorists. The rights of radical jihadists to avoid searches and seizures shall be protected, even if they are granted more protection than American citizens. Some believe that terrorists have the rights to intelligence leaks. Terrorists have the right to read about classified and antiterrorist intelligence programs in the press because there has not been a vigorous effort either through this committee or through the intelligence community to stop the leaks. And then actually when corporations may help us like the telecommunications companies may have, people who agree to help us will not be protected. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. I yield myself 2\1/2\ minutes. Mr. Speaker, defeating the threat from radical jihadists is a difficult job. It requires input from the legislative branch. It requires leadership from the executive branch. After 9/11, the administration outlined a series of initiatives. It didn't outline it to the entire Congress because the threat was so new, or some thought so new. The decision to respond to it was very different than what happened in the 1990s, but we recognized we needed to take different steps. The administration brought in people from Congress, the people that the leadership and our colleagues had entrusted with the responsibility to shape an intelligence community. Everyone talks about the President's terrorist surveillance program, the President's financial tracking system, and now, it is the President's interrogation system. What they forget to note, as pointed out in the editorial today, is that in each of those cases, membership from the House and the Senate were involved in the process, in reviewing and setting the direction and implementing the strategies and the tactics that they thought needed to be put in place to keep America safe. Some of those Members that were briefed have moved on to other careers and they are no longer in Congress. Some of those who were briefed back in 2002 and 2003 specifically on the terrorist surveillance program, specifically on interrogation, are still Members of the House. Some are still members of the committee. Others are serving on other committees. Some have moved into leadership positions in the House of Representatives. It is interesting, as the majority leader is speaking and laying out his arguments, it is the Speaker of the House, elected by the entire House, today, who serves the entire House, who is briefed on these programs. Some who have looked at, who have remarked on those meetings said, not only did the people that were in those meetings support the techniques and the methods that were put in place, some actually even asked the question, Is it enough? These things were decided in a process that the House and the Senate and the administration participated in and decided jointly that these were the things that were necessary to keep America safe. Only when they became public, all of a sudden did some of these individuals get cold feet, feet of clay and say, Oh, well, I really didn't know. But when the rubber hit the road in terms of what we needed to do to keep America safe, these people said these are the techniques and the processes, and these are the programs that we need to have in place. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes. As we continue to talk about this bill, and I agree with my colleague, the chairman of the committee, that as we go through this process, it is a democratic process, that you're not going to get everything that you would like to have. I appreciate the chairman's support on the amendment that we put in place in conference that said if the administration doesn't fully brief both intelligence committees on what happened and what we knew and what we didn't know about the attacks in Syria on September 6 by Israel, that we would fence off funds and they would not be available to the community to spend, because I believe that's an instance where the committee's being fully informed will enable us to better do our jobs because oversight is absolutely essential. But when I take a look at the totality of the bill, I don't believe that it moves us in the right direction. As my other colleague from California just stated, in 2005, when the National Intelligence Estimate came out and talked about their weapons programs, we both, together, voiced skepticism about the quality of the intelligence, not the quality of the analysis, but do we really have in place the sources and methods to make the kinds of conclusions that were made in that National Intelligence Estimate. And I think we both concluded that back in 2005, reaching those conclusions with high confidence, we weren't sure you could do that. Now, in 2007, we find out that in 2005 we were right and the community was wrong. We share some of those same concerns today. It is why it is so important that we build an intelligence community and where I think that this bill comes up short. With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. At this time, I yield myself an additional 2 minutes. As we talk about the totality of the bill and why this bill comes up short, let me highlight a couple of other areas. The conference report would subject four key positions, including the head of the NSA, the NRO, to the politicized Senate and confirmation process. If there is one thing that we've recognized through this process and through what's happened over the last few years, it is that the less politics, the less politicalization that we have in the intelligence arena, the better off we are. Creating four new confirmed positions in the Senate takes us in exactly the wrong direction. The conference report would create a duplicate of a cumbersome new DNI Inspector General that would provide little significant new oversight. This is not about whether there should be an Inspector General with very clear powers in the Office of the DNI, but let's make sure that those responsibilities are clearly aligned with the accountabilities and the responsibilities of the Inspector General in the Department of Defense. A number of these agencies in the community are dual functioned. What does that mean? It means that they have reporting responsibilities to the Director of National Intelligence, and they have responsibilities to the Secretary of Defense. And if we're going to create an Inspector General in the DNI, let's make sure that that Inspector General is coordinated with the activities in the Department of Defense. This bill fails to do that. This bill also takes the DNI in a couple of other directions. It grows the staff on a bipartisan basis in the House in a very different position than from where the Senate is. We want to cap the size of the DNI. It's not a doing function. This bill not only grows the size of the DNI; it gives them new responsibilities in terms of science and technology. The DNI was never intended to be a doing function; it was intended to be a coordinating function. This moves it again in the wrong direction. Mr. Speaker, with that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to my colleague from the State of Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Mr. HOEKSTRA. I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, it wasn't all that long ago that this House voted 249- 160, a difference of 89 votes, to instruct House conferees to eliminate all earmarks from the fiscal year 2008 Intelligence authorization bill and to fully fund human intelligence collection. The vote was clear, overwhelming, and bipartisan, and 62 Democrats supported the motion to instruct. It appears, however, that my colleagues on the other side have said one thing and done another on earmarks, as the conference refused to eliminate earmark projects from the classified annex to this bill. Today, we are going to offer a motion to recommit that provides all Members, including those 62 Democrats who supported the motion to instruct, to take a decisive step to eliminate earmarks in national security bills. If you are for that motion to instruct, you shouldn't be against this motion to recommit. Putting it in the positive, you should be for this motion to recommit because you were for eliminating earmarks a week ago. This motion would make our priorities clear by eliminating provisions providing for earmarks to allow those funds to be directed to improve intelligence collection. As I explained on the floor last week, and as the bipartisan support for the motion indicated, I believe that a consensus is developing among Members that programatic authorizations should be determined solely on their national security merits, absent other compelling circumstances. This motion is clearly about priorities. America is at war. We are engaged in a struggle against radical jihadists, as well as facing threats from China, North Korea, Iran, drug cartels, and those types of things. Taxpayer dollars that are currently slated to be earmarked to individual Member projects should be applied to our most critical areas of need and should serve our Nation as a whole during this crucial time. It is clear that the earmarks that are in the bill generally have not gone through the same rigorous substantive review and evaluation that intelligence programs receive in the formulation of the President's budget. It is critical to our world position that we fully understand the military capability of, and threat posed by, other nations. It is essential that human intelligence activities are fully funded so that we may make fully informed decisions concerning our national interest. Our dedication of resources to human intelligence is a direct investment in the security of this Nation as a whole and the safety of the men and women serving on our behalf. It is also a direct investment in those areas that we know we are weakest in: human intelligence. This motion would eliminate all earmarks. It shouldn't be controversial. But these funds could be put to far better use in human intelligence and other programs. These are programs that we need. Some of these earmarks have been described clearly as wasteful government spending. This bill has not provided adequate support to the intelligence community activity at the forefront of the ability to protect our national security. It is not possible to describe all of these programs. Many of them are classified in their nature. But I can't emphasize enough the importance of these programs and the funding and the necessity to fund these programs at this time. We are a Nation locked in a struggle, facing continued uncertainty and other threats around the globe. The men and women of the front lines of this struggle rely heavily on human intelligence for their own safety every day. The House should not diminish its support for a robust, empowered, and capable intelligence community that provides our first line of defense. It is time to properly focus our priorities. I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this motion to recommit and will support me in my opposition to this bill. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. HOEKSTRA

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Madam Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.