CIA nominee Hayden defends NSA programs

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Friday, May 12, 2006 · Last updated 1:36 p.m. PT

CIA nominee Hayden defends NSA programs

By KATHERINE SHRADER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITERS


WASHINGTON -- CIA director nominee Gen. Michael Hayden on Friday defended the secret surveillance programs he oversaw while head of another spy agency as lawful and designed to "preserve the security and the liberty of the American people."

But one of the phone companies asked by that agency to turn over its customers' call records - Qwest Communications Inc. - refused after deciding the request violated privacy law, a lawyer said Friday.

Hayden's visits to lawmakers on Capitol Hill were complicated by reaction to public disclosure of the National Security Agency program that has been building a database of millions of Americans' everyday telephone calls. Hayden declined to comment on the database, but spoke about the NSA's work in general terms.

"Everything that the agency has done has been lawful. It's been briefed to the appropriate members of Congress," Hayden told reporters outside a Senate office. "The only purpose of the agency's activities is to preserve the security and the liberty of the American people.

"And I think we've done that," he said.

The White House stood by Hayden as he spent another day promoting himself in face-to-face sessions with lawmakers. President Bush announced Hayden as his choice to head the CIA on Monday.

"We're 100 percent behind Michael Hayden," press secretary Tony Snow told reporters Friday. "There's no question about that, and confident that he is going to comport himself well and answer all the questions and concerns that members of the United States Senate may have in the process of confirmation."

However, Snow said, if some questions involved classified material, Hayden may not be able to answer them or would have to do so in an alternative session with certain lawmakers who are cleared to get such information.

Meanwhile, a lawyer for former Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio confirmed that the government approached that company in the fall of 2001 seeking access to the phone records of Qwest customers, with neither a warrant nor approval from a special court established to handle surveillance matters.

"Mr. Nacchio concluded that these requests violated the privacy requirements of the Telecommunications Act," attorney Herbert J. Stern said in a written statement from his Newark, N.J., office.

Nacchio told Qwest officials to refuse the NSA requests, which kept coming until Nacchio left the company in June 2002, Stern said.

In contrast, AT&T Corp., Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. complied with the government's request to turn over phone records shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, USA Today reported on Thursday.

After meeting with Hayden on Friday, Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., said that he has "absolute confidence" in the general and said his Senate confirmation hearings would help get the facts on the surveillance programs.

"He's going to have to explain what his role was. To start with, did he put that program forward, whose idea was it, why was it started?" Hagel said. "He knows that he's not going to be confirmed without answering those questions."

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, praised Hayden as an excellent nominee but said Congress should ask tough questions about the NSA programs.

Collins, chairwoman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said it was disconcerting "to have information come out by drips and drabs, rather than the administration making the case for programs I personally believe are needed for our national security."

Earlier Friday, Democratic Sen. Joe Biden blasted the surveillance program but called Hayden "a first-rate guy."

"He's caught right in the middle of this," Biden, of Delaware, told CBS' "The Early Show." "I think it's going to make it difficult."

In a poll taken Thursday, almost two thirds of Americans said it was acceptable for the NSA to collect phone records. When asked if they would be bothered if the NSA had their phone records, Democrats and independents were more likely to be bothered than Republicans. The ABC-Washington Post poll surveyed 502 people by telephone.

Lawmakers have been demanding information from the Bush administration about the NSA's database of telephone records, begun while Hayden was in charge of the spy agency.

The disclosure, reported in Thursday editions of USA Today, could complicate President Bush's bid to win Hayden's confirmation. It also renewed concerns about civil liberties and questions about the legal underpinnings for the government's actions.

Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., said the NSA was using the data to analyze calling patterns in order to detect and track suspected terrorist activity, according to information provided to him by the White House.

"Telephone customers' names, addresses and other personal information have not been handed over to NSA as part of this program," Allard said.

The president on Thursday sought to assure Americans their civil liberties were "fiercely protected."

"The government does not listen to domestic phone calls without court approval," said Bush, without confirming the NSA program.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said he would call the phone companies to appear before the panel in pursuit of what had transpired.

The NSA is the same spy agency that conducts the controversial domestic eavesdropping program that had been acknowledged earlier by Bush.

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AP writer Michael J. Sniffen contributed to this story.