Obama: Permission needed to access NSA phone data

He said his changes should address the privacy and civil liberties concerns prompted by the government holding the metadata — information, but not the content, about millions of phone calls made by Americans as well as suspected terrorists overseas.

The NSA would continue to collect and store the information. 

Obama said he also will consult with the relevant committees in Congress.

The president has faced mounting pressure from civil-liberties groups and members of both parties to stop the sweeping phone-data collection program since NSA leaker Edward Snowden revealed details about the scope of the government’s surveillance last year.

Obama has defended the NSA’s surveillance, arguing that it has thwarted terror attacks and saved lives, and said that any reforms should focus on restoring the public’s trust in the agency.

But senators on both sides of the aisle have pressed Obama to stop the phone metadata collection and overhaul other aspects of the NSA’s spyingprograms.

An outside review group set up by the president called for 46 reforms to the government’s surveillance practices, including forcing the NSA to stop storing records on phone calls.

Obama’s proposal falls short of that demand – at least for now – because it will allow the phone-record collection to continue. Still, it is stronger than anticipated. Obama plans to set up a panel of civil-liberties advocates on the secret court that grants surveillance warrants and to end the practice of spying on international leaders’ phone calls, a source of international outrage. He plans to punt most other potential changes to Congress.

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., one of Obama’s harshest critics in Congress on the NSA’s surveillance, said the president is right in calling for stronger congressional oversight of the nation’s spying capabilities and practices, but for that to work, the leaders of the intelligence committees and others relevant panels need to “be straight to the [rest of the] Congress. Again and again that has not been the case.”

Even before Snowden revealed the government’s sweeping phone- and Internet-data collection programs, Wyden was privately pressing the administration for information about it and caused a stir last year when he questioned Director of National Intelligence James Clapper whether the NSA collects “any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans.”

Clapper misled Congress by denying the existence of the classified surveillance program.

— Susan Crabtree, White House Correspondent

 

SENATE REPORT BLAMES STATE DEPARTMENT FOR NOT PREVENTING BENGHAZI 

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s long-awaited report on Benghazi said the deadly attack on the U.S. consulate could have been prevented and faults the State Department for failing to respond to the deteriorating security situation despite numerous warnings.

The committee also concluded that the administration’s Benghazi talking points wrongly blamed protests over an anti-Islam video as the cause of the attack. Top Obama officials, including Susan Rice, then the U.N. ambassador and now national security adviser, repeatedly cited the protests for inciting the attack.

The reports found that intelligence analysts took too long to collect intelligence and eyewitness statements that would have contradicted the initial finding that the attack was sparked by a spontaneous protest at the U.S. compound.

The panel concluded that the attack, which killed four Americans including Ambassador Chris Stevens, was preventable, based on extensive intelligence identifying terrorist activity in Libya and given the known security shortfalls at the U.S. Consulate and CIA annex in Benghazi. Intelligence reports had cited prior threats and attacks against Western targets in the country.

Benghazi became a flashpoint during the final months of the 2012 presidential election, with Republicans charging that the Obama administration tried to play down evidence that it was a premeditated terrorist attack to help his campaign.

The Senate report didn’t strongly address the hotly debated topic of what role, if any, al Qaeda played in the attack. Instead, it simply said that “individuals affiliated with terrorist groups,” including al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Anshar al-Sharia, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Mohammad Jamal Network participated in the “well-armed” assault.

Republicans on the committee criticized Hillary Clinton in the “Additional Views” section of the report, saying that “the final responsibility for security at diplomatic facilities lies with the former secretary of state … We believe there should be a full examination of her role in these events, including on the night of the attacks.”

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the panel, blasted the GOP for using the report for “political purposes” and in particular for what she termed unfair criticism of Clinton, the presumed 2016 Democratic presidential frontrunner.

— Susan Crabtree, White House Correspondent

 

ANOTHER OBAMACARE DEADLINE DELAYED

The White House delayed another Obamacare deadline, pushing back by more than a month the date when people with pre-existing conditions must enroll in new health plans.

The administration had already delayed the Pre-Existing Conditions Insurance Plan (PCIP), which was designed to help people with serious medical conditions move to Obamacare coverage.

Department of Health and Human Services officials, though, said they needed more time to make sure those patients received insurance coverage, pushing the expected Jan. 31 deadline back to March 15.

“As part of our continuing effort to help smooth consumers’ transition into marketplace coverage, we are allowing those covered by PCIP additional time to shop for new coverage while they receive the ongoing care and treatment they need,” said HHS spokeswoman Joanne Peters.

The latest extension comes after a series of executive-branch delays of core components of the Affordable Care Act.

The administration has pushed back until 2015 the employer mandate and the cap on out-of-pocket medical expenses. The White House also recently pushed back the deadline for when consumers had to pay their first month’s premium and exempted those with canceled health plans from the individual mandate this year.

Republicans say the delays prove President Obama’s signature domestic initiative wasn’t ready for prime time. The White House counters that it is giving consumers more flexibility to ensure the viability of the most sweeping overhaul to the health care system since Medicare.

The administration said the latest extension would be paid for with unused funds already slated for the program.

— Brian Hughes, White House Correspondent

 

GOP POUNCES ON LACK OF CHARGES IN IRS PROBE

Republicans ramped up their criticisms of the probe into the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative groups after it was revealed that the FBI does not plan to file criminal charges in the matter.

GOP leaders have long accused the Obama administration of glossing over the controversy, saying executive-branch officials whitewashed a clear attempt by the IRS to punish right-leaning groups.

Republicans are now even more incensed after a report from the Wall Street Journal said the FBI isn’t expecting to pursue criminal charges against anyone involved in the controversy.

“The administration’s internal investigation — led in part by an Obama donor — has little credibility,” said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.

The apparent lack of charges comes just days after lawmakers revealed that the Justice Department official leading the investigation had donated money to both of President Obama’s White House campaigns.

Officials found that Barbara Bosserman, of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, donated $6,750 to Obama for his 2008 and 2012 presidential bids.

The DOJ said Bosserman’s appointment was proper and that it could not legally question the political donations of employees when making personnel decisions.

Conservative groups who say they were targeted, though, contend the inquiry by the administration amounts to an investigation in name only.

“What investigation?” asked Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer for many of the groups who say they received extra scrutiny from the IRS.

“You’d think they might have at least have called me or the hundreds of victims of the Tea Party scandal,” she added. “It was a very narrow, if you don’t look, you won’t find it’ strategy.”

White House officials said they would not comment on an active investigation. But one senior administration official told the Washington Examiner that Republicans were engaged in a “sad, political witch hunt.”

Documents show that conservative groups were targeted more heavily than liberal organizations, especially those with “Tea Party” or “Patriot” in their names.

— Brian Hughes, White House Correspondent

 

BIDEN THANKS FORD MOTOR CO. FOR ‘SAVING OUR ASS’

Vice President Joe Biden thanked Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. “for saving our ass.”

Biden made the remark as he met with Ford and Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., while they toured the North American International Auto Show in Detroit.

The vice president was referring to the 2008-2009 auto crisis, according to the pool report. Ford was the lone American automaker to not receive government aid.

In a speech at the event, Biden touted the turnaround of the American auto industry and said that without the federal government’s help the nation faced the “likely collapse of the automobile industry.”

“We bet on American ingenuity, we bet on you, and we won,” Biden said.

The vice president predicted that the 21st century would be “the American century in manufacturing.”

“Mark my words — not just in automobiles, but manufacturing coming back to America,” Biden said. “It’s coming back because we have a legal system that protects people’s contract right, where intellectual property is protected, where we have the finest research universities in the world, where we produce the single-best technological capability the world has ever seen.”

He also predicted the revival of Detroit, home of the nation’s auto industry, and the largest American municipality to declare bankruptcy.

“This is not only an important city, but an iconic city,” Biden said. “It represents, symbolizes the manufacturing might of the United States of America all through the 20th century.”

— Meghashyam Mali, Assistant Managing Editor

 

MCCONNELL TRIES TO FORCE VOTE TO REPEAL EPA POWER PLANT RULE

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said he wants to use a congressional maneuver to force a vote to repeal proposed Environmental Protection Agency emissions rules for new power plants.

The Kentucky Republican said he and 40 other Republicans would seek to use the Congressional Review Act to compel that vote. The little-used rule allows lawmakers to repeal “major” rules with a simple majority vote. The law applies to rules that have an annual economic impact of at least $100 million; cause a major increase in costs to consumers, governments and businesses; or significantly hurt competition, employment, investment and U.S. companies’ global competitiveness.

The EPA rule’s detractors say it would do just that by raising energy costs.

But it’s uncertain whether the ploy would work, as the Congressional Review Act is reserved for challenging final rules. The EPA recently proposed the regulation, making its finalization about one year away.

President Obama almost certainly would veto the resolution, which would tear down a cornerstone of his climate agenda. Republicans, who have tried and failed with this approach in previous attempts to block EPA regulations, wouldn’t have the votes to override it.

The Sierra Club, which says the rule will cut medical costs and curb greenhouse gas emissions that drive climate change, slammed McConnell’s move.

“Mitch McConnell has made a sport out of abusing Senate rules, and now he’s just inventing new ones as it suits him. That’s not how lawmaking works,” said Melinda Pierce, deputy legislative director with the Sierra Club. “McConnell’s political maneuver is like asking for instant replay before the football is even snapped.”

McConnell, however, argued that the proposed rule “immediately changes the legal landscape for anyone seeking to develop a fossil fuel power plant.”

In a letter to Government Accountability Office Comptroller General Gene Dodaro, McConnell said compliance with the rule is not attainable without carbon capture and sequestration systems that “are still in the developmental stages and are extremely costly.”

The EPA rule would bar construction of new coal-fired power plants without the technology, which traps carbon emissions and stores them underground.

— Zack Colman, Energy & Environment Writer

 

OBAMA TOUTS INITIATIVE TO EXPAND COLLEGE ACCESS

President Obama announced new measures with colleges across the country to expand access for low-income students, touting the effort as a successful initiative that didn’t rely on congressional action.

“We want to make sure more young people have a chance at a higher education,” Obama said at a White House summit, announcing the new commitments from more than 100 colleges and 40 educational institutions.

The president, whose legislative agenda was stalled on Capitol Hill last year, has vowed that 2014 will be a “year of action” and has vowed to use executive actions when lawmakers fail to act.

Obama said the higher education push was a “great example” of how the administration could act without “a whole bunch of new legislation.”

“I’m going to work with Congress where I can to accomplish this, but I’m also going to act on my own if Congress is deadlocked,” he said. “I’ve got a pen to take executive actions where Congress won’t, and I’ve got a telephone to rally folks around the country on this mission.”

A number of universities have signed up for the effort to ensure that low-income students can more easily enroll in top institutions and to see that they graduate.

The measures include remedial education for middle and high school students, as well as ramped-up tutoring and test preparation for students in college. The College Board will grant fee waivers for eligible students who take the SAT college-entrance exam.

Obama said the education initiative was part of his effort to tackle income inequality, arguing that college had long provided a ladder for low-income Americans to rise into the middle class.

“The fact is it’s been getting harder to do that for a lot of people,” Obama said. “It is harder for folks to start in one place and — and move up that ladder. And that was true long before the recession hit.”

— Meghashyam Mali, Assistant Managing Editor

 

DAVIS OUTRAISES RIVAL IN BID FOR TEXAS GOVERNOR

Wendy Davis raised $12.2 million in the last six months of 2013 in her bid to become Texas’ first Democratic governor in 20 years, outpacing Republican Greg Abbott, who hauled in $11.5 million from July through December.

Davis rose to national prominence last year during a marathon statehouse filibuster to stop Texas’ anti-abortion legislation. Although she ultimately failed, the state senator gained support from Texas Democrats and the national party.

She raised roughly $8 million, while the Texas Victory Committee Inc., a joint fundraising effort between her and a group trying to turn Texas into a blue state, raised an additional $3.5 million between July 1 and Dec. 31, her campaign announced. Davis brought in 71,843 individual contributions, with about 85 percent of those $50 or less.

Abbott, Texas’ attorney general, has $27 million on hand for the race, taking in $16.3 million for the year, his campaign said. Davis’ campaign did not release cash-on-hand figures. Incumbent Republican Gov. Rick Perry is not seeking re-election.

“Texas remains a seriously red state, even if Democrats have enjoyed some measure of electoral success in cities such as Austin, Dallas and Houston,” said Dave Levinthal, senior political reporter at the Center for Public Integrity and former reporter for the Dallas Morning News. “So no matter how much cash she raises, and no matter her rising star, the Texas political climate remains a fairly inhospitable one for a liberal candidate like Davis seeking statewide office.”

Levinthal added, though, that $12 million will allow Davis to fund a strong ad blitz.

— Steve Doty, Staff Writer

 

SEVEN NOBEL PRIZE-WINNING ECONOMISTS ENDORSE HIGHER MINIMUM WAGE

Dozens of top economists, including seven winners of the Nobel Prize for economics, have signed a letter endorsing the Democrats’ bid to raise the minimum wage.

Addressed to congressional leaders, the open letter organized by the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute recommends legislation introduced by Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., that would increase the federal minimum wage from its current $7.25 hourly rate to $10.10, indexed to increase with inflation.

The letter says the legislation would directly benefit 17 million workers by 2016, and that “another 11 million workers whose wages are just above the new minimum would likely see a wage increase through ‘spillover’ effects, as employers adjust their internal wage ladders.”

The economists also dismiss concerns, voiced by congressional Republicans who oppose the bill, that raising the minimum wage would reduce employment in low-wage occupations. They write that the “weight of evidence” shows that minimum wage hikes have “little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labor market.”

Speaking at an event at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington to introduce the letter, White House economic adviser Jason Furman called raising the minimum wage “one of the most important tools we have” for addressing poverty and inequality in the U.S. “We fundamentally think that you want to set a minimum wage so that if you’re working full-time, year-round, you’re going to be able to raise your family above the poverty line,” Furman said. Taking into account tax credits, Furman said, the $10.10 line would lift 1.6 million people out of poverty.

— Joseph Lawler, Economics Writer

 

EX-OBAMA PASTOR JEREMIAH WRIGHT SLAMS PRESIDENT IN SPEECH

Jeremiah Wright, the former spiritual mentor to President Obama who shouted “God damn America,” used his speech at a breakfast held by the Chicago Teachers Union to slam the president’s military and foreign policy.

In his keynote speech at the event honoring Martin Luther King Jr., Wright said that although King declared, “I have a dream, Barack says, I have a drone.” He called for a rejection of the “three-headed demon” of “racism, militarism and capitalism,” according to a report by the Chicago Sun-Times.

“Every Tuesday morning, there’s a kill list that the president decides who they’re going to kill this week,” Wright said.

Union President Karen Lewis told Politico she was not concerned about any negative publicity for having him as a speaker. “He’s a theologian and scholar.”

Wright, who baptized Obama’s children and gave Obama the inspiration for the phrase “the audacity of hope,” was subsequently repudiated by the president in 2008 after videos of sermons surfaced showing him saying the U.S. got its just desserts in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and that AIDS was created specifically to destroy African-Americans, among other viewpoints.

— Sean Higgins, Senior Writer

 

US FALLS OUT OF TOP 10 IN INDEX OF ECONOMIC FREEDOM

The United States has fallen out of the top 10 countries in the 2014 Index of Economic Freedom published jointly by the Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal.

The index, the 20th published by the two organizations, rates countries by 10 criteria. This year, the U.S. fell two spots to 12th place, leapfrogged by both Ireland and Estonia. Hong Kong ranked first, as it has every year.

America’s score on the index has fallen for seven straight years, and the conservative Heritage Foundation now ranks the U.S. as only “mostly free.” The top countries on the index — Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, Switzerland, New Zealand and Canada — all rank as “free.” The decline in America’s ranking was driven by slipping scores in the categories of “fiscal freedom, business freedom and property rights.”

America’s decline came amid an overall uptick across the world in economic freedom as measured by the index, led by improvements among countries in the Asia-Pacific region such as Burma, Malaysia and Samoa, and in sub-Saharan African nations, including the post-conflict countries of Sierra Leone and Liberia.

The communist nations North Korea and Cuba brought up the rear of the index. Several war-torn countries, such as Syria and Afghanistan, were not ranked.

— Joseph Lawler, Economics Writer

 

JIM BEAM SALE TO JAPAN ‘A FAILURE OF OUR TAX CODE,’ SAYS KENTUCKY CONGRESSMAN

Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., says the sale of the company that makes Jim Beam and Maker’s Mark bourbon to a Japanese company was a result of bad U.S. tax policy.

“I feel like that could be a failure of our tax code,” he explained, when asked for comment on the sale by the Washington Examiner.

Suntory Holdings Ltd., a privately owned Japanese company, announced the purchase of Beam Inc. for $13.6 billion, shocking American bourbon drinkers.

Massie noted that the Kentucky distillery was not in his district, but he said he closely follows the bourbon business in his state.

“We need tax reform, we need significant tax reform, the domestic distillers are at a disadvantage,” he added, promising to explore the issue further.

— Charlie Spiering, Commentary Writer

 

POSTAL SERVICE IG FINDS SEX ON THE JOB, STALKERS AND SLASHED TIRES

Letter carriers stalked customers and U.S. Postal Service employees were caught getting personal in the back room while on duty, according to the agency’s inspector general.

The USPS IG investigated multiple assault cases last year, which were released to the Washington Examiner through a Freedom of Information Act request. Personal information was redacted from the reports.

In perhaps the strangest case, a mail carrier in Maine became overly friendly with a female customer, showing her a photo of himself dressed as a woman and asking whether she liked men dressed in drag.

Shortly after the conversation, the married letter carrier called and asked her on a date, which she refused.

A few days later, he delivered the mail to her door instead of her mailbox and tried to kiss her, according to the report. This happened two more times before the customer stopped answering her door.

When the carrier wouldn’t leave her alone, the customer reported him. He hired a lawyer, refused to talk to the IG, and the case was referred to the Postal Service for administrative action. The records made public are not clear as to the outcome of the case.

Another letter carrier was accused of befriending and then sexually assaulting children along his mail route. He pleaded guilty to simple assault and was sentenced to 12 months in the county jail, 11 months of which were later suspended. He was also fired.

An Ohio postal employee claimed another employee, her ex-husband, raped her on government property, but an investigation determined that the sexual contact was consensual.

According to the report, the man came up behind his ex-wife, wrapped his arms around her, and told her he wanted her back. They snuck into a locked back room where things got steamy.

Meanwhile, he had started dating another employee, making his ex-wife jealous.

Another encounter between employees was less friendly when a sales associate slashed the tires of another employee’s car and damaged her fender after getting in trouble for coming back late from a lunch break.

The sales associate later turned himself into the New York Police Department and pleaded guilty to harassment and damaging property. He was ordered to pay restitution.

— Michal Conger, Staff Writer

 

CALIFORNIA’S MILLER TO RETIRE AFTER 20 TERMS, JOINING EXODUS

Rep. George Miller, a California Democrat and close ally of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, said he would retire after 20 terms as a congressman.

“This is a great institution and I cannot thank my family and my constituents enough for having given me the honor and privilege of representing my district in Congress these past 40 years,” he said.

Miller joined an exodus of lawmakers who are retiring, including two recently announced departures: Democratic Rep. Jim Moran of Virginia and 11-term Republican Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon of California, who is chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. McKean’s departure was expected, while 12-term congressman Moran’s was not.

Miller is the top-ranking Democrat on the House Education and the Workforce Committee and is the fifth-longest serving congressman. He was just 29 when he was first sworn in in 1975.

He famously lives in a group house with Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and is the landlord of their Capitol Hill abode.

Schumer joked about their arrangement when news broke of Miller’s retirement, writing on his Twitter account, “Seeking roommate. 20 terms in the House & unmatched legislative record preferred. Lover of cold cereal a must.”

Miller will remain in office another year and will spend it pushing for an extension of unemployment insurance, a higher minimum wage and comprehensive immigration reform.

“What a wonderful experience this has been,” he said.

— Tim Mak, Congressional Correspondent