After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, Congress created the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) to improve our nation's intelligence gathering. The goal was to provide America's intelligence community with the strongest possible tools to anticipate and prevent another catastrophic attack.
The DNI oversees 16 intelligence agencies and advises the President and Congress on how best to detect terrorist plots. A large part of this effort involves intercepting the communications of terrorists overseas. These intercepts provide vital information that keeps our nation safe.
At least, they did - until a law authorizing our intelligence officials to use this crucial element of our national defense to the fullest extent expired at midnight on February 16. It expired because the U.S. House of Representatives, under Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her Democratic leadership, refused to act.
Even though an overwhelming, bipartisan majority in the U.S. Senate voted to extend this law, a majority of congressmen in the House indicated their willingness to do the same, and the DNI had been urging Congress to act for nearly a year, Speaker Pelosi chose to shut the House down and go on vacation instead.
Now, our intelligence officials are forced to battle 21st-century terrorists under old laws written in the disco era. Dating back to 1978, these laws don't take into account 30 years of technological advances - and so now to intercept terrorist plots, intelligence officials must follow outdated, cumbersome approval processes.
Also, because the law as written in 1978 does not protect phone companies from lawsuits for helping the government trace terrorist calls, those companies now face crushing lawsuits. Such litigation may be good for trial lawyers, but it jeopardizes the financial future of the phone companies - who are only trying to aid the war effort in good faith.
The DNI and others across the intelligence community have credited the capture of multiple terrorists and the disruption of significant terrorist cells to the updated, expanded law that the House allowed to expire. But today, terrorists can breathe a lot easier.
Intelligence officials who once could listen to phone conversations between terrorists overseas with appropriate speed are now legally barred from following new leads without first following antiquated, bureaucratic procedures - even if neither of the terrorists is physically within the United States.
If a member of a previously unknown terror cell calls an eager new recruit in Pakistan, our agents now must go before a judge to demonstrate probable cause.
If a Marine in Iraq captures a terrorist from a previously unidentified terror group, our agents will not be free to call the phone numbers in this terrorist's laptop right away.
If a call is placed to one of the numbers in this terrorist's laptop and routed through U.S. phone lines, our agents will have to apply for a warrant, even though the people on the other end of the phone are half a world away, the terrorist with the laptop is not an American, and all this takes place in a theater of war.
It's hard to believe Speaker Pelosi and the House Democratic leadership don't want us to have all possible tools at our disposal to protect this country from attack. But faced with an urgent warning by the DNI, they have apparently concluded that they know better.
Over six years have passed without a successful terrorist attack on American soil. That hasn't happened because they've stopped trying. It's because our government has made every effort to defend our homeland. Having the best intelligence capabilities is a crucial part of that defense.
As the House reconvenes, the Democratic leadership must allow a vote on this vital national-security legislation to ensure we are doing all we can to keep our citizens safe. As lawmakers, we have no higher responsibility.
- Senator McConnell is the Senate Republican Leader and only the second Kentuckian to lead his party in the U.S. Senate.
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