Hayek auditorium here at cato for our 2019 surveillance conference. Weve been doing this for some five years now. When we launched this in the aftermath of disclosures about bulk nsa collection by form and as a contractor snowden, the nsa itself was a fairly obscure agency unfamiliar to most americans. And as we kick off our 2019 conference we find that now even intelligence oversight is itself very much in public headlines. We have an impeachment preceding kick off in significant part by a report from the Intelligence Community inspector general. We have forthcoming next week ill breathlessly awaited report on allegations of misuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act during the 2016 president ial campaign. We have proceedings aired, actually would be from the House Intelligence Committees. Even intelligence overseers are at the senate and the sense of our political discourse in a way the intelligence agencies itself began to be earlier in this cycle in a in a way that was unprecedented since the 1970s. We have a special focus this year on not just the intelligence agencies themselves but also the mechanisms in place to oversee them. One of the classic problems of intelligence and surveillance in a free society is how to balance the need for operations that are inherently secret. Surveillance that is done publicly in a in a sense that s definitely not effective surveillance. How do you balance the certain kinds of operations information gathering in secret while at the same time rendering those who have power accountable to the public, the democratic mechanisms, given the unfortunate history around the world but certainly in our country as well, secret surveillance power being accused for political purposes. We have a program at today that includes a discussion with one of the most important bodies doing that oversee, the privacy and Civil LibertiesOversight Board this afternoon. Will have discussions on the renewed war on strong encryption, one of the mechanisms that ask to check largescale collection. Were going to examine later this morning some of what we have learned about compliance issues or misuses of largescale surveillance authorities under, authorities such as 702 and 215 and in the Intelligence Community is seeking to address those and how effective those corrective mechanisms have been. But you start up i think appropriately were going to begin with an overview of the intelligence oversight apparatus. What are all the different entities that are working to keep the secret use of power in check . Did operate effectively and how can they be improved . That are a few People Better i think suited to lead that discussion that our moderator, Liz Hempowicz was a policy director of the project on government oversight which does excellent work working to increase transparency and accountability across government. Ill pass it off to the variable Liz Hempowicz to editors are worse panel. Thank you so much. Let me give some brief introductions. Our panelists have long, storied careers and so their full bios are on the conference website and i encourage you to check them out. Genevieve lester is the de serio chair of strategic intelligence an associate professor at the u. S. Army war college. She recently published her first book, when should state secrets stay secret . Accountability democratic governance and intelligence to Cambridge University press. Daniel schuman who is demand progress, issues that concern government transparency, accountability and reform come Civil Liberties, National Security and promoting an open internet. Is a nationally recognized expert on transparency accountability and capacity. David barrett is a professor of Political Science at Villanova University and author of among other titles the cia and congress, the untold story from truman to kennedy. The Washington Post called a triumph of research and one amazon reviewer called it one of the coolest books out there. And professor Margo Schlanger is the mccree professor of law, in civil and criminal detention. I think to kick us off before we get into what are some of the problems with oversight of Intelligence Community, we should understand what are the mechanism that exist to conduct oversight over this relatively secret governmental apparatus. So professor slinger, hope you dont mind im going to come to you first. Youve looked extensively at the mechanism for internal oversight at the National Security agency or the nsa. Can you talk over the about those and the benefits and limits to internal Oversight Offices and then were going to go into some of the external Oversight Offices of that exist. Great. I come at this conversation from the role of the former come as a former head of the Civil Rights Office of the department of Homeland Security where i played a role as internal overseer for the tiny sliver of the ic is located at dhs but i got interested in nsa at the center of this. If you think broadly about the internal office placed on the role of complaints with extra imposed norms and what you might broadly see in terms of oversight its a pretty big list of the suspect some of my fellow panelists will quarrel with the inclusion of some of these offices on this list but i needed to make sure i i didnt skip any. I needed notes. There is at the nsa i Compliance Office responsible for aspects of compliance with especially the strictures of the fisa court and also the 12333 rules. Theres the office of general counsel which functions in part as an Oversight Office although in large part not. In large part as an enabling office to enable its client to do with his client wants to do but in some degree thats also an Oversight Office. Theres the nsa ig which is more independent obvious at the bears the Civil Liberties and Privacy Office act the nsa which is both a policy role, policy creation role to be at the table when policy is originated, a policy implementation role and an oversight role. There is, at the department of justice theres the National Security division. A quote that unlike the says this is not such a big Oversight Office comes from a doj official called the nst the place that ic goes to get blast. So that makes us are not very oversight like, but other people disagree with that and say yes, that functions as an Oversight Office. Theres the intelligence oversight function at the department of defense. Theres the Intelligence Community igs office. Theres at odni the Civil LibertiesProtection Office which particularly has a role in 702 compliance work. Theres the odni office of general counsel. The odni mission, its his integration. Thats not right, is a . I think it is right. Mission integration, function which can have some complaint oversight sorts of function. Theres the presence intelligence advisory board, intelligence Oversight Board. Theres the fisc itself which is internal so now im making for my role here and the pclob which of the people talked much more about. But then to do two more minutes if thats the right amount of time. The challenge of oversight internal Oversight Offices is simultaneously, the offices, internal Oversight Offices are desired item agencies they work for because they want the blessing of those offices. They want the extra credibility that such blessing gets them. If they can create enough authority or enough of a reputation that the blessing actually carry some reputational benefit. Thats the thing they want from the. They might also want the expertise but they dont always want the expertise. What they mostly want is the blessing. The the in the question is what comes with that . What comes with that has to be some kind of actual bring into the agency the norm office is designed to for the period if its Civil Liberties office there has to be some Civil Liberties credibility that comes with that. What those offices have did it if theyre going to be effective is to have to maintain simultaneously their influence in the agency and their commitment to whatever the external norm is. Its a norm that Academic Work sometimes called a precarious valley, a value that is challenge in the agency and it is continually under threat. This office whatever it is, say the Civil Liberties and Privacy Office, has to carry a sustained commitment to Civil Liberties and privacy against what is a really very Strong Mission orientation that tends to run against that value. It has to do that simultaneously while maintain influence in the agency, and thats the challenge. And so how can it do that . Well, it has to maintain pretty strong affiliation both with the agency and simultaneously with external points outside the bureau. If that neither can be threaded, and will have more time to talk about it, what it can do is inside the office for more empowered entities that can tell people what to do as opposed to just advise them. It can increase Public Access by writing reports, both reports that are publicly available and reports that either get leaked or disclose in discovery but generating internal papers that becomes external. And it can build the relationship with external advocates that helps agency respect the norms in question. That the basic idea. It sounds hopeless. My position on this, its that help us but boy, very, very hard. Internal Oversight Offices certainly serve a purpose, but they cant be the only check on a special in the Intelligence Community could be really extreme abuses of their authorities. Can i just say its only because theyre not empowered enough to be the only check but if there the only check, they would use both influence and they lose the external orientation they need to succeed. Both under authorized but also because they would just lose whatever influence and commitment they have if they are the only check. Putting aside questions of their effectiveness for now, this is a question to the whole group, what are some of the major external oversight bodies applicable and oversight of the Intelligence Community . Whoever wants to take it. We can start briefly with congress. There are two full committee on intelligence and they have existed since the mid to late 1970s. Theres been a logic, sort of constitutionally derived logic of congressional oversight of executive Branch Agencies that goes back to the presidency of george washington. In terms of congressional oversight as intelligent and my specially has been cia, whose very informally carried out in the 40s to the mid70s but not very adequately, certainly not systematically. And so now we have the house and the Senate Intelligence committees which one hopes dashed in the thing is about intelligence agencies, surveillance pulse signal is so much of it is carried out and must be carried out in secret. So on behalf of the American Public we have democratically elected officials to try to monitor the secret activities. Heres the president , also congress and especially these two committees to present over legislation to keep them functioning to create boundaries, to investigate and see their performing with both Conference Also legality. Can i i pick up on that a little bit . I would argue for the Commission Oversight committee usually intended to rebalance information asymmetry when it comes to relationship with the extra World Intelligence agencies. Looking at this complicate the executive branch ownership of intelligence information. The Congressional Committee balance that by asking questions bringing in people requiring reports, testimony that type of thing and i think what david touched upon is both cameras were set up in the 70s in the wake of scandals. The church in Pike Committees investigated for allegedly intelligent abuses and were stood up as a way, a bipartisan way of putting bounties on intelligence activities. This is the scandalous, or the birth from scandal that these committees can select Committee Show is an interesting political piece of the whole picture, that the intelligence oversight was to rather sporadically and then the body politic decided we needed something more formal to be put in place to rebalance this relationship. When you think about congressional oversight, its not just House Senate Intelligence committee. For example, eyes is overseen in part by the judiciary committee. The story for the house and Intelligence Committee is being overseers to being the supporters are almost the boosters for the Intelligence Community. The role they play has changed from church in Pike Committee role to being no, no, we will be your biggest advocates. Other places will, the government and county Building Office which has a number of folks who are intended to aid comics in getting questions answered. The Intelligence Community tried to work around gao and among the ability to engage in oversight but they do have that role. Theres also the inspectors general that exists and we can talk about the spell than i can, theres dissidence, whistleblowers, there are a number of players that help educate and bring in congress, congress is a major point of leverage where you can actually force folks into question. You see a lot of games get played. Theres 1. 1 Million People with top topsecret or higher clearances. Theres already something people on House Intelligence Committee. The number of senators who have access to a staffer with a clearance is 37. Most senators dont have someone who can get the basic questions answered. When you talk to oversight, to what degree, to what extent of whom, with what help. And i think when you look at it in the congressional contacts, the political games that are played, just go back for one final second, its a select committee which means the members of are chosen by the speaker in the minority leader. It is not missed any Committee Like judiciary. Its members are supposed to reflect the composition of the chamber over but it does happen and the fact oftentimes that ive represented so the record if somebody from judiciary. David. With the cabinet anyone from that committee. There is the overseers but to the extent to which they oversee is an interesting and open question. If nobody else but of the role of whistleblowers in overseeing the Intelligence Community, i definitely was going to some glad to be me to it, daniel. Doctor baird, your book, examines the years between the years of the cia and the bay of pigs invasion. [inaudible] do you think congressional oversight any Intelligence Community has changed much since those dark ages . Oh, i think there are some common features across all those many decades but it changed very such as because in the old days, in the first three decades or so there were tiny and very secretive subcommittees of the Armed Service committee, said appropriation committees, and so four of them and sometimes some of them performed somewhat effectively but there was no alltime staff devoted to this task review and members of Armed Services and appropriations committees and the subcommittees who would assign some of their staffers to spend some of their time in assessing them and monitoring, especially cia. So what was that old system wasnt as awful as the history books say. Thats one of the conclusions of my book but it was never anything like comprehensive or systematic. Now we have these big committees. Maybe they are too big, these Intelligence Committees, but as has been pointed out other committees engaging in oversight but we have a lot of members of congress who at least cant examine with intelligence agencies are doing. My sense, when i spoken to former legislative liaisons for cia and i spoke to a couple of them, i have to say for what its worth they were very unimpressed in the years where they did that work with the sort of attention and questioning that ca received