Senate Accord with President Could Mean Immunity for Telcos

The number of political parties doing business in Congress was nearly called into question today, as Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D - Vt.) railed against Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman - and fellow Democrat - Jay Rockefeller (D - W.V.) for, according to The Hill this afternoon, "caving" to the wishes of the President. Sen. Leahy's comments come following the announcement that Republican and Democratic senators including Rockefeller had reached an agreement with Mr. Bush late last night on substitute language for amending the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

As senators announced this morning following a White House meeting, a bipartisan agreement would amend the Senate's version of the RESTORE Bill. One new provision would grant telecommunications companies immunity from prosecution by individuals who believe their personal data may have been inadvertently turned over to US government officials, in the course of federal investigations. During a press conference on Wednesday, the President stated he would veto any FISA legislation that omitted such a provision.

In exchange, the Washington Post reported this morning, a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court would conduct an audit and review of past government practices in so-called "warrantless surveillance programs." The newly agreed to language has yet to be reported by the Library of Congress, so it is not clear yet whether the compromise bill contains the House version's restrictions limiting warrantless surveillance to "non-US persons."

But that House version now appears stalled, as word of the accord reached enough House Democrats late last night for them to withhold debate on the bill, which had been scheduled for today.

Speaking prior to the continuation of hearings for Attorney General-nominee Judge Michael Mukasey, Sen. Leahy said he believed the administration must be fully aware of the illegality of conduct he says it was involved in, allegedly including utilizing FISA under false pretenses to gather information on US citizens. "Otherwise there wouldn't be so much pressure on us to immunize illegal conduct by either people acting within our government or within the private industry," he said.

Despite the accord, the amended language may need to garner the approval of the Judiciary Committee before it can proceed to the Senate floor for a vote. But indications were today that Democrats were not united behind Leahy, as Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D - Calif.) indicated her tentative approval of the agreement, if only for the fact that it's bipartisan.

Regardless of the President's recently low approval ratings, his tried and tested divide-and-conquer approach, as seen in Wednesday's press conference, appears to remain quite effective.