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Pelosi Seeks Review of Briefed Congressmen
Washington Post/AP
By KATHERINE SHRADER
The Associated Press
Tuesday, May 2, 2006; 6:57 PM

WASHINGTON -- House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi asked President Bush's national security adviser Tuesday to review the administration's decision to classify the dates and the names of the Congress members who were briefed on its warrantless surveillance program.

Pelosi, D-Calif., requested the information in December, after Bush and his top advisers said repeatedly that dozens of briefings were held for congressional leaders.

Because the information was determined to be classified, Pelosi said the information is locked up in the House Intelligence Committee. Access has been limited to select members of Congress, including Pelosi, who want to be able to talk publicly about general information on the briefings.

"This is not national security information by any definition, and I therefore find the decision to classify it to be inconsistent with classification standards and completely without merit," she said in a letter to National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley.

A spokesman for Hadley declined to comment on a letter he had not seen.

Pelosi said that Bush, Vice President Cheney and other officials have repeatedly described the National Security Agency's program publicly, sometimes providing operational details.

"To hold that the information covered by those statements was not classified, but that the identities of those briefed and when those briefings took place is, encourages the belief that the administration makes classification decisions solely for political purposes," Pelosi told Hadley.

The program run by the ultra-secret NSA monitored the calls and e-mails between someone in the United States and someone overseas, when one party was thought to be linked to al-Qaida.

The Bush administration has condemned the leak of the program's existence and has launched an investigation to find out who was behind it. Privacy and civil rights groups have filed lawsuits and criticized the operations as a gross abuse of presidential power.

In a speech in Texas last week, the No. 2 U.S. intelligence official, Gen. Michael Hayden, said al-Qaida and its affiliates still pose the greatest terror threat to the United States and its interests abroad.

Hayden, the former NSA Director, said the surveillance program targets that threat, which is why he and others "have been so visible in the past few months, both explaining the program and defending its lawfulness, effectiveness and appropriateness."

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