U.S. Congress to Review Homeland Security, Terrorist Financing, NSA Surveillance Program

By Andrew Cochran

Committees in the U.S. Congress will hold a number of open terrorism-related hearings this week on a variety of topics:

September 12, 2006
Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee
Treasury's Role in Combating Terrorist Financing
Full committee hearing on "Examining Treasury's Role in Combating Terrorist Financing Five Years After 9/11."
Witnesses: Assistant Treasury Secretary for Terrorist Financing and Financial Crimes Patrick O'Brien; Robert Werner, director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) at the Treasury Department; Adam Szubin, director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control at the Treasury Department; and Eileen Mayer, director of the Fraud/Bank Secrecy Act of the Small Business/Self Employment Division at the Internal Revenue Service
Location: 538 Dirksen Senate Office Building. 10 a.m.

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee
Homeland Security Outlook
Full committee hearing on "Homeland Security: The Next Five Years."
Witnesses: Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff; Sheriff Leroy Baca of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department; Richard Falkenrath, deputy commissioner for counter terrorism, New York City Police Department; Steven Simon, senior fellow for middle eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations; and Daniel Prieto, senior fellow and director of the Homeland Security Center at the Reform Institute
Location: 342 Dirksen Senate Office Building. 9:30 a.m.

House Appropriations Committee
Afghan Drug Eradication and Rebuilding Programs
Foreign Operations, Export Financing and Related Programs Subcommittee hearing on "Afghanistan Interdiction/Eradication of Illegal Narcotics and U.S. Lead Rebuilding Programs."
Witnesses: TBA
Location: 2359 Rayburn House Office Building. 10:30 a.m.

House Judiciary Committee
FISA Reform
Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security Subcommittee hearing on H.R.5825, the "Electronic Surveillance Modernization Act."
Witnesses: Steve Bradbury, acting assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Justice Department; Vito Potenza, deputy general counsel at the National Security Agency; Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies; and Bruce Fein, principal of Bruce Fein and Associates
Location: 2141 Rayburn House Office Building. 4 p.m.

September 13, 2006
Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Lebanon Cease-Fire
Full committee hearing on "Lebanon: Securing a Permanent Cease-Fire."
Witnesses: Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs David Welch; Carlos Pascual, vice president and director of foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution; Paul Salem, director-designate of the Carnegie Middle East Center, Beirut, Lebanon; and Augustus Richard Norton, professor of international relations and anthropology at Boston University
Location: 419 Dirksen Senate Office Building. 9:30 a.m.

Senate Judiciary Committee
Foreign Surveillance Overhaul/Pending Business
Full committee markup of pending business including S.2453, the "National Security Surveillance Act of 2006."
Location: 226 Dirksen Senate Office Building. 9:30 a.m.

House Energy and Commerce Committee
Cyber Security
Telecommunications and the Internet Subcommittee hearing on "Cyber Security: Protecting America's Critical Infrastructure, Economy, and Consumers."
Witnesses: TBA
Location: 2123 Rayburn House Office Building. 10 a.m.

House Government Reform Committee
Iraqi National Reconciliation
National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations Subcommittee hearing on "Part II: What Will it Take to Achieve National Reconciliation?" This hearing is the second in a series of three hearings focusing on "Iraq: Democracy or Civil War?"
Witnesses: Qubad Talabani, representative of the Kurdish Regional Government; Hajim Hassani, former speaker of the Iraqi Parliament and a Sunni member of Parliament; Karim Almusawi, representative of the largest political party in Iraq, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a Sh'ia party; and David Satterfield, former deputy to U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad in Baghdad and currently Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's senior adviser on Iraq
Location: 2154 Rayburn House Office Building. 10 a.m.

House Homeland Security Committee
DHS Cyber and Telecommunications Security
Economic Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Cybersecurity Subcommittee hearing on "The Future of Cyber and Telecommunications Security at DHS (Homeland Security Department)."
Witnesses: Homeland Security Undersecretary for Preparedness George Foresman; David Powner, director of information technology management issues for Government Accountability Office; Paul Kurtz, executive director of the Cyber Security Industry Alliance; William Pelgrin, director of the New York State Office of Cyber Security and Critical Infrastructure; Guy Copeland, chairman of the Information Technology Sector Coordinating Council; and David Barron, chairman of the Telecommunications Sector Coordinating Council
Location: 2212 Rayburn House Office Building. 3 p.m.

House Homeland Security Committee
Homeland Security Information Network
Intelligence, Information Sharing, and Terrorism Risk Assessment Subcommittee hearing on "The Homeland Security Information Network"
Witnesses: TBA
Location: 2212 Rayburn House Office Building. 1 p.m.

House Science Committee
Border Security Technology
Full committee hearing on "How Can Technologies Help Secure Our Borders?"
Witnesses: Homeland Security Undersecretary for Science and Technology Jay Cohen; Gregory Giddens, director of the Secure Border Initiative Program Executive Office at the Homeland Security Department; Gregory Pottie, associate dean for research and physical resources at the Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science at UCLA; Gervasio Prado, president of Sentech, Inc.; Dan Tyler, head of the National Security Technology Division at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory; and Peter Worch, independent consultant
Location: 2318 Rayburn House Office Building. 2 p.m.
September 14, 2006

Senate Appropriations Committee
U.S.-British Systems to Catch Terrorists
Homeland Security Subcommittee hearing on "Catching Terrorists: the British System versus the U.S. System."
Witnesses: Richard Posner, federal judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and senior lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School; John Yoo, professor at Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California at Berkeley; and Tom Parker, CEO, Halo Partnership Consulting, former officer in the British Secret Service (MI5)
Location: 192 Dirksen Senate Office Building. 9:30 a.m.

House Appropriations Committee
FBI Transformation
Science, State, Justice, and Commerce, and Related Agencies Subcommittee hearing on "FBI Transformation."
Witnesses: TBA
Location: 2359 Rayburn House Office Building. 1:30 a.m.

House Homeland Security Committee
Nuclear and Biological Attack Prevention Science
Prevention of Nuclear and Biological Attack Subcommittee hearing on "The Science of Prevention."
Witnesses: White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director John Marburger; Homeland Security Undersecretary for Science and Technology Jay Cohen; Vayl Oxford, director of the Domestic Nuclear Detention Office in the Homeland Security Department; William Happer, physics professor at Princeton University; and Ronald Atlas, past president of the American Society of Microbiology
Location: TBA. 2 p.m.

House International Relations Committee
U.S.- Middle East and Central Asia Policy
Middle East and Central Asia Subcommittee hearing on "Is There a Clash of Civilizations? Islam, Democracy, and U.S.- Middle East and Central Asia Policy."
Witnesses: Tony Blankley, editorial editor at The Washington Times; Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy; Hillel Fradkin, director of the Center for Islam, Democracy and the Future of the Muslim World at The Hudson Institute; and Steven Simon, senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations
Location: 2200 Rayburn House Office Building. 10 a.m.

September 15, 2006
House Government Reform Committee
Consequences of U.S. Withdrawal from Iraq
National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations Subcommittee hearing on "Part III: What Are the Consequences of Leaving Iraq?" This hearing is the last in a series of three hearings focusing on "Iraq: Democracy or Civil War?"
Witnesses: Fouad Ajami, director of Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies; James Fearon, professor of political science at Stanford University; and Peter Galbraith of the faculty of the National War College
Location: 2154 Rayburn House Office Building. 10 a.m.

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