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Specter says he'd cut NSA funding

BY TOM BRUNE | Newsday Washington Bureau

April 28, 2006

WASHINGTON - Frustrated about the Bush administration's refusal to give information about its controversial warrantless wiretapping, a Republican committee chairman threatened yesterday to cut off funding for the surveillance program.

In an amendment filed to the supplemental appropriation bill, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) proposed yesterday to dry up funds for the National Security Agency program until the administration fully briefs the congressional Intelligence and Judiciary committees about it.

But at an afternoon news conference, Specter, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, made clear for now that he would not act on his threat.

"For the record, I'm not prepared to call for the withholding of the funds," he said, because it might be "a vital program" protecting us from terrorism.

"But I think that it is important to elevate the public consciousness of what is going on here," Specter said.

He said he might also introduce a bill and hold hearings.

The program, he said, fails to follow the law requiring court approval before NSA wiretapping of U.S. calls and e-mails.

Specter took his frustration public a day after he spoke with President George W. Bush about the program at a White House meeting with committee chairmen on Wednesday.

Specter said he told Bush that "the responses of the executive branch were insufficient" and "pointed out that the president doesn't have a blank check" in the war on terrorism.

Specter also criticized the GOP-controlled Congress.

"What we have here, regrettably, is an inert Congress, a Congress which has not stood up to the executive branch," he said.

A White House spokeswoman said appropriate members of Congress are briefed.