[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 97 (Wednesday, June 17, 2015)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E914]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          INTELLIGENCE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2016

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                               speech of

                          HON. EARL BLUMENAUER

                               of oregon

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, June 16, 2015

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the state of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 2596) to 
     authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2016 for 
     intelligence and intelligence-related activities of the 
     United States Government, the Community Management Account, 
     and the Central Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability 
     System, and for other purposes:

  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Mr. Chair, today I will vote against H.R. 2596, the 
Intelligence Authorization Act for FY2016, because this bill continues 
the expansion of our intelligence community and includes harmful policy 
riders that will only serve to make America less safe, not more.
  While large portions of the intelligence budget are classified, 
publicly available estimates are as high as $80 billion a year. That's 
in addition to the more than $580 billion we're set to spend on defense 
in the next 12 months. If today's bill moves forward, funding will 
again rise by nearly $6 billion. Worse, it would do so by sidestepping 
Congressionally-imposed budget caps, while continuing to enforce these 
arbitrary rules for critical domestic programs, from education to 
medical research.
  Efforts by the majority to undercut our president's ability to 
conduct foreign policy are nothing new, but for the first time this 
bill would put in place additional barriers to finally closing 
Guantanamo Bay, a recruiting tool available to terrorists so long as 
its doors remain open. It would also limit the types of information our 
intelligence community can share with our allies, a level of discretion 
best left to the President himself.
  There are over 4.5 million federal employees and contractors with 
access to secret information, which is larger than the entire 
population of Los Angeles. I am concerned that the amount of 
information being reviewed by the intelligence community and number of 
people involved may actually be making us less safe.
  Today's bill is a missed opportunity to reevaluate methods of 
domestic surveillance, the growing size of the intelligence 
bureaucracy, and ending programs, like Guantanamo Bay, that only harm 
our national security, not help it.

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