Russ Feingold Challenges Dennis Blair on Cheney/CIA investigation

By GottaLaff

Via DKos:

After the House Intelligence Committee announced that they would investigate:

... whether the CIA broke the law by not informing Congress promptly about a secret program to deploy teams of killers to target al-Qaida leaders.

...then this Uh-Oh Moment happened: Obama Official Says Secret CIA Program Was Legal, Breaks With Dems

That official was Dennis Blair. Then I updated...

Rebuke time, and you can count on more coming:

Rep Jan Schakowsky, a key House intel committee member and a leading critic of the program, sent me a statement rapping Blair, Obama’s director of national intelligence.

“The issue of lying, misleading, or withholding information from the Congress is a very serious issue and deserves the full attention of the House Intelligence Committee,” she said.

Looks like I wasn't too far off:

And today, Sargent reports that Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) also took note and has challenged Blair to put up or shut up, writing:

According to a story on Thursday in the Washington Post, you stated that the failure to notify the congressional intelligence committees about a program recently cancelled by CIA Director Leon Panetta did not violate the law. I disagree and believe that the program in question fit squarely within the notification requirements of the National Security Act. I therefore request that you provide me with your analysis, and any analysis by the DNI General Counsel, supporting your conclusion.

As sternly worded letters^tm go, this one cuts right to the chase, and as Sargent points out, it:

... creates an awkward choice for the White House. It can either walk back Blair’s comments, or openly defend the program as legal, putting the White House at odds with House Dems who are probing the program for possible lawbreaking.

To be continued...

Sources: House Lays Groundwork for Potential CIA Probe

By GottaLaff

Drumbeat getting louder... louder...

The House Intelligence Committee asked the CIA to provide documents about the now-canceled proposal to kill Al Qaeda leaders, and agency officials said it would comply with the request, congressional officials said Tuesday. [...]

The House request for documents is likely a precursor to what would likely become a full-blown investigation into the secret operation and why the program was not disclosed to Congress. Panetta, meanwhile, has ordered a thorough internal review of the program, agency spokesman George Little said.

The House Intelligence Committee will try to establish how much was spent on the effort, whether any training was conducted and whether any officials traveled in association with the program, a committee official said. Those factors would determine whether the program had progressed enough to warrant congressional notification, the official said.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, is expected to decide as early as this week whether to press ahead with a full investigation into the CIA operation. [...]

Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., said Monday that the CIA's failure to brief Congress violated the law.

Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., the senior GOP member of the committee, said he would support an investigation. But from what he knows now, Hoekstra said, he does not believe the effort merited congressional notification.

House Chairman Says CIA Lied to Lawmakers

By GottaLaff

CIA? Lie? No-o-o, they'd never do that. I'm shocked, shocked I tell you:

House Intelligence Chairman Silvestre Reyes has suggested Republicans would be well advised to avoid politicizing the intelligence authorizaton bill later this week in light of evidence that, he says, shows that the CIA “affirmatively lied to” the panel.

In a Tuesday letter to his committee’s top-ranking Republican, Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, that was obtained by Congressional Quarterly, Reyes, D-Texas, wrote that the committee has recently received information that reveals significant problems with the intelligence agency’s reporting to the panel.

“These notifications have led me to conclude this committee has been misled, has not been provided full and complete notifications, and (in at least one occasion) was affirmatively lied to,” Reyes wrote.

Reyes did not describe or detail the alleged false or misleading statements to the committee.

There's more.