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Curated research library of TV news clips regarding the NSA, its oversight and privacy issues, 2009-2014

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Primary curation & research: Robin Chin, Internet Archive TV News Researcher; using Internet Archive TV News service.

Speakers

George W Bush
President 2000-2008
KQED 05/13/2014
Gellman: nearly the entire political appointment list at the Justice Department, from the attorney general on down (would resign). And no president could survive that in an election year. Narrator: The next morning, the President decided to have a private talk with Acting Attorney General Comey. Gellman: After the national security briefing, Bush says to Comey, "Stay a minute. Come talk to me." And Cheney starts to follow, and Bush says, "No, no, this is just the two of us." And he says, "What's going on here? How could you possibly do something of this importance at the very last minute?" Comey suddenly realizes that the president had no idea what had been happening. The president thinks this just began yesterday. He doesn't know it's been going on for three months. And so he says, "Mr. President, if that's what you've been told, you have been very poorly served by your advisors.
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George W Bush
President 2000-2009
KQED 05/13/2014
Narrator: The President then sent for FBI Director Mueller. Gellman: Mueller is waiting downstairs a level, outside the Situation Room. Some aide goes and says, "The President wants to see you right now, get in there." And Bush says to Mueller, "Go tell Jim Comey to fix this. I withdraw the order. You go make it right." Narrator: The warrantless email data collection was shut down. The crisis was averted. But at the White House, they were determined to resume it. Lizza: And so they're sort of sifting through the FISA law, they're sifting through the Patriot Act trying to find existing laws, existing authorities, you might call it loopholes, to justify these programs.
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George W Bush
President 2000-2008
KQED 05/13/2014
Audio TV reporting: Bush on day two of his tour to defend the Patriot Act, this time in Buffalo, New York... In Buffalo, he continued his push for an extension of the anti-terror law... Narrator: That same year, the president hit the campaign trail, publicly arguing there was no warrantless surveillance program. Bush: Nothing has changed, by the way. When we're talking about chasing down terrorists, we're talking about getting a court order before we do so. Lichtblau: Bush got up there several times and said, "When you hear about us wiretapping, that means we're getting a court warrant." Well, we knew that wasn't true. He was leaving out this whole other side of the equation in terms of the NSA operation. Bush: It's important for our fellow citizens to understand, constitutional guarantees are in place when it comes to doing what is necessary to protect our homeland, because we value the Constitution. Thank you for coming.
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Bill Keller
Executive Editor, The New York Times, 2003-2011
KQED 05/13/2014
Narrator: The President then played his trump card, threatening that the New York Times would be responsible for the next attack. Keller: He said, you know, "Listen, if you guys publish this article and there is another 9/11, we're going to be called before Congress to explain how we failed to prevent it, and you should be in the chair beside us explaining, because you'll be complicit in allowing damage to our country." He was saying, in effect, "You, Arthur Sulzberger, will have blood on your hands if there's another attack that could've been prevented by this program." I think anybody would feel goosebumps.
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George W Bush
President 2000-2008
KQED 05/13/2014
Bush: I authorized the National Security Agency, consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution, to intercept the international communications of people with known links to al Qaeda and related terrorist organizations.Narrator: It was the least controversial and smallest element of the program. There was no reference to the massive gathering of domestic communications data. Gellman: His characterization of the facts was simply wrong. And it was wrong from the beginning. The program wasn't to surveil known suspects, known conspirators. You could easily get a warrant for that. The program was to sift big data. It was to trawl through enormous volumes, literally trillions of telephone calls, trillions of emails, and to look for unknown conspirators.
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