Anger mounts in Congress over US telephone surveillance program

After a closed-door briefing of the House of Representatives, politicians call for bipartisan response to 'spying on Americans'

Xavier Becerra, a senior Democrat, said there hadn’t been enough oversight of government surveillance programmes. Photograph: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP

Dan Roberts

Tuesday, 11 June 2013

Anger was mounting in Congress on Tuesday night as politicians, briefed for the first time on the US government's telephone surveillance programmes, called for an immediate bipartisan response to what they called "spying on Americans".

Intelligence chiefs and FBI officials had hoped that the closed-door briefing with a full meeting of the House of Representatives would help reassure members about the widespread collection of US phone records revealed by the Guardian.

But senior figures from both parties went into the meeting with "serious concerns" and came out more alarmed at the extent of the programme that many claimed never to have heard of until the revelations.

Xavier Becerra, leader of the House minority caucus and one of the most senior Democrats in Congress, said there had not been enough oversight of government surveillance programmes.

"We are now glimpsing the damage," he said, referring to failures to repeal the Patriot Act sooner. "It was an extraordinary measure for an extraordinary time but it shouldn't have been extended."

Others said the White House and intelligence committee leaders had been misleading when they claimed all members of Congress were briefed about the telephone record-keeping programme.

"There was a letter that we were supposed to have received in 2011 but I can't find it and most of my friends in Congress did not receive this either," said New Jersey Democrat Bill Pascrell, who claimed the widespread collection of phone data amounted to "spying on Americans … This is one of the first briefings I have been too where I actually learned something."

The anger was apparent in both parties. The conservative Republican Steve King of Iowa predicted joint action from Congress would be imminent. "There is going to be a bipartisan response to this," he said.

Pascrell said: "There were no Democrats or Republicans in there at all, which is a healthy sign, it means we can get something done about this."

Another Republican, Tom McClintock of California, claimed the programme amounted to an abuse of fourth amendment rights. "Going back to the days of British rule we have sought to stop the authorities barging in on people's privacy just in case they found something," he said. "The fourth amendment was passed to make sure that never happened and it is time to make sure it does not ever happen again."

Elijah Cummings, another Democrat unhappy at the Obama administration's security practices, came out of the secret briefing saying: "We learned a lot [but] I'm not comfortable."

The briefing followed a lull in anger over the surveillance programmes as attention was diverted towards whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Earlier the Republican House Speaker, John Boehner, called Snowden – the 29-year-old former intelligence contractor who revealed the surveillance programmes – a traitor.

But it now looks increasingly certain that Congress will take steps to try to rein in the power of the intelligence services.

In the Senate a bipartisan group of eight senators introduced a bill aimed at forcing the US federal government to disclose the opinions of a secretive surveillance court that determines the scope of the eavesdropping on Americans' phone records and internet communications.

And in a lawsuit filed in New York the American Civil Liberties Union accused the US government of a process that was "akin to snatching every American's address book".

Pascrell said: "People should know what's going on in their name but we need to start with Congress knowing what the heck is going on."