Intelligence oversight has some limits in Congress

The White House insists members of Congress knew full well about the National Security Agency’s almost unabridged ability to scan phone logs and Internet chats for terrorist threats — and the potential that Americans’ communications could be caught in the fray. But evidence of the NSA’s many privacy missteps wasn’t widely shared on Capitol Hill, even during crucial moments when Congress voted to reauthorize the government’s controversial surveillance powers.

One Obama Administration report provided to lawmakers last year, for example, only opaquely referenced the NSA’s unlawful collection of thousands of Americans’ emails. The document, declassified this fall, didn’t mention that a secret court had rebuked the agency for its misleading statements. Adding to the trouble, House leaders possessing the oversight report didn’t explicitly advertise it to members, and some lawmakers in both chambers who did see it weren’t allowed to take notes out of the room, according to documents and congressional staffers. Both the House and Senate still later in 2012 reauthorized some powers under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), one of the laws in question in light of leaks from Edward Snowden. At a time when Congress is rethinking the rules that govern the NSA — and whether or how to tighten them — the Hill’s previous lapses raise as many questions about the intelligence agency as they do about congressional oversight.