May 19, 2006 – 8:44 p.m.
When the National Security Agency assigned Bill Semenick to be its liaison to the Homeland Security Department three years ago, he found he didn’t have a parking space, a desk or a secure computer link back to his Ft. Meade, Md., headquarters.
But about 18 months ago Semenick finally got a direct, secure link to NSA’s computers from DHS’ Nebraska Ave. complex, along with liaison officers from the two other Pentagon outfits that use satellites to keep track of the conversations and movements of people.
Now a congressional panel wants to know what kind of intelligence the NSA has been providing to the Homeland Security Department, and what it’s been doing with it.
On Tuesday, members of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Information Sharing will finally get a chance to ask Charlie Allen, DHS’ intelligence chief, what he knows, and when he knew it.
Allen will first brief subcommittee members behind closed doors. The following day, he’s scheduled to testify in open session on other matters, but he’ll be asked about NSA’s relationship with DHS.
The arrangements have not been made public until now.
“I want to know if he’s got information collected by the NSA, either from the wiretapping program, data mining program or other NSA programs, how that information is flowing into the system, and what steps they could take to sequester that information,” said Rep.
Over the last six months, Lofgren pointed out, the focus has been on what NSA has been collecting, with little attention to how it’s used, and by whom.
“We know information is being collected — how much, we don’t know,” said Lofgren in a brief telephone interview. “We don’t know the details of all the programs, but if we’re going to be distributing it and kind of bleeding it out into this whole network in the United States, we need to know, number one, is it coming in, how is it coming in, how’s it being used, how’s it being distributed, and where does it end up?
“I mean, are local law enforcement agencies going to utilize this for arrests? I have a lot of questions.”
Allen, who arrived at DHS last September after four decades at the CIA, has few comfortable options when he’s questioned by subcommittee members.
If he’s been giving state and local police intelligence reports that he knows came from the NSA’s warrantless wiretap programs, he may wish he was back at the CIA, which specializes in stealing information.
If he doesn’t know where the NSA intelligence originated, he won’t look very careful.
If he tells panel members that he didn’t get any intelligence from the NSA’s wiretapping data, they may say, “What are you, chopped liver?”
It won’t be the first time DHS intelligence has been left out of the loop. The FBI, CIA and Pentagon spy agencies have been eating DHS’ cheese since it was created in 2002, despite the authority Congress gave it to be the nation’s primary domestic intelligence coordinator.
The only “good” option Allen has, in the opinion of a former top DHS intelligence official, is if he can tell panel members he sought the counsel of DHS’ lawyers when NSA wiretap data started flowing through the pipelines, and that they, in turned, conferred with their NSA counterparts.
“And then,” said the source, “that they walked in lockstep thereafter” with the legal blessing of the Justice Department and White House.
The potential problem, says Lofgren, an attorney, is that by using warrantless NSA data, state and local police and prosecutors might have been using “fruit from a poisonous tree,” as the lawyers call it.
“That doctrine could very well come into play,” Lofgren said. “Since information in the hands of the Homeland Security department is supposed to flow down, even to local law enforcement officials, that doctrine may come into play.”
It’s no small issue, since DHS and the Justice Department have devoted more than a half-billion dollars into building up local and state police intelligence operations, as David Kaplan reported in U.S. News & World Report on May 8. “The funding has helped create more than 100 police intelligence units reaching into nearly every state,” which meld with federal intelligence services in over a hundred joint task forces.
“Over 6,000 state and local cops now have federal security clearances, allowing them to see classified intelligence reports,” Kaplan reported.
“I’ve tried to make a number of efforts to find out what the heck is going on, but I’ve been stonewalled so far,” Lofgren said, blaming subcommittee Chairman
Sources said Lofgren felt Simmons had promised her an earlier briefing on the NSA-DHS relationship, then reneged.
A Simmons’ spokesman called Lofgren’s complaint “somewhat unfair.”
“We don’t have jurisdiction over NSA,” said Simmons’ Chief of Staff Todd Mitchell, adding, “Ms. Lofgren does sit on the Judiciary Committee, which does have jurisdiction over NSA.”
In return, Lofgren cited the permanent presence of an NSA liaison officer at DHS, who is “providing cryptological signals intelligence, information assurance and operational security to the Department of Homeland Security and the homeland security community at large.”
But unfortunately for Lofgren and others who might want to use the committee as a stage for questions on the DHS-NSA nexus, Chairman
On Tuesday, however, Mitchell promised, “we will discuss issues that Ms. Lofgren will find interesting.”
It sounds very much like the script the Senate Intelligence Committee followed with the nomination of Air Force Gen.
DHS spokesperson Russ Knocke said the department had no comment, “given that NSA is obviously not a part of the department.”
Back at NSA, meanwhile, all’s still mum.
“The terrorist surveillance program remains highly classified,” NSA spokesperson Don Weber said by e-mail. “Therefore, it would be irresponsible of us, as cryptologic professionals, to discuss actual or alleged operational issues surrounding the program, as it would give those wishing to do harm to the United States insight and potentially place Americans in danger.
“It is important to note,” Weber added, “that NSA takes its legal responsibility very seriously and operates within the law.”
Switchitter: A Pentagon lawyer who’s been riding herd on Defense Department espionage projects is jumping to a Washington law firm that represents whistleblowers in the spy agencies. Carl F. “Bud” Meyer Jr., who recently retired from his position as assistant general counsel for human intelligence support at the Defense Intelligence Agency, where he worked for 15 years, has joined Krieger & Zaid.
Hot Type: Historian and journalist Christian Parenti offers a survey of the history of surveillance in America in “The Soft Cage: Surveillance in America, from Slavery to the War on Terror.” The book illustrates the extent to which the “ever-growing infrastructure of high-tech voyeurism” is being used by both government and businesses in order to follow “your movements, schedules, habits and political beliefs,” touts Basic Books.
As for Big Brother, Parenti’s book offers “a brilliant field guide to understanding and subverting it,” says Mike Davis, author of “Dead Cities” and “City of Quartz.”
Off campus: Economist and University of Maryland criminology professor Peter Reuter and economist Edwin Truman take on domestic and international money laundering in “Chasing Dirty Money: The Fight Against Money Laundering,” “the most seminal study ever undertaken of the effectiveness of global efforts to deal with the growing threat to U.S. national security and to the world financial system of money laundering,” says Stuart E. Eizenstat, former deputy Treasury secretary.
From Brookings comes “Protecting What Matters,” essays from 11 experts on the “role that technology can play in combating terrorism” and the need to protect civil liberties and laws.
Speaking of protection, R. William Johnstone’s new book, “9/11 and the Future of Aviation Security” challenges “the notion that 9/11 was primarily a result of intelligence failures . . . rather . . . it was mainly an aviation security systemic failure,” says the author. The book explains, “why the system failed on 9/11 . . . what has been done in aviation and transportation security since 9/11,” and “outlines a suggested approach for improving current U.S. transportation security,” writes the publisher. . . .
Attention, Hall Monitors: The second edition of “Introduction to Homeland Security,” “an effective teaching tool and a valuable reference guide,” according to publisher Butterworth-Heinemann, has just arrived.
CQ/Homeland Secuity intern Ethan P. Sommer contributed to this column.
Jeff Stein can be reached at jstein@cq.com.