The GOP is pitching itself as a more suitable partner for the CIA and its director. GOP Senate would be intel ally

Republicans are promising to confront the Obama administration at every turn if they win the Senate, fighting environmental regulations, health care reform and presidential nominees.

But they aren’t vowing to be especially tough on the Central Intelligence Agency or transform the broader intelligence community.


In fact, the GOP is pitching itself as a more suitable partner for CIA Director John Brennan and the National Security Agency than the Senate Democratic majority, which has sparred with them over data snooping and adherence to congressional oversight.

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“The biggest shift is that you have more people who are more security-related rather than just bashing the intelligence community,” said a Republican Senate aide. “We want people that are supportive but we want people to do oversight … conversely we don’t want people who are openly hostile.”

Democrats say it’s just doing their job.

“If by ‘hostile’ they mean ‘aggressively exercising their constitutional oversight role’ then they are absolutely correct,” shot back a Democratic aide.

Sources say the leading contender for GOP Intelligence Committee chairman is Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), a low-key but blunt hawk who is close friends with Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio). If he becomes the panel’s leader, he’ll try to clear the slate after conflicts between current Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Brennan over the CIA’s intrusion into Senate files and the release of a long-awaited report on Bush-era interrogation policies.

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“Dianne may have some problems with it but I think we’ve gotten a full accounting of what happened,” Burr said of the CIA’s search of Senate documents. “Listen, I think there’s some mistakes but I don’t think it’s the first director that’s made mistakes.”

Feinstein has largely backed off her public criticisms of Brennan for unauthorized intrusion into a Senate investigation of CIA interrogation techniques. But panel Democrats’ confrontation with the CIA continues to simmer over nearly everything surrounding the document that details waterboarding and secret prisons of a decade ago.

Democrats want a swifter release, fewer redactions and an apology from the CIA. Many Republicans just want the thing to go away.

“If you want to make mistakes from being repeated and you want to want to make intelligence agencies stronger, you’ve got to have the truth come out. You can’t sit on the truth,” said Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon.

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Wyden, also a leading advocate for data collection reform, will become the committee’s second-most senior Democrat with the retirement of Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) in January. He is now threatening use of an arcane Senate procedure called Senate Resolution 400 to force the CIA report’s release without waiting on the White House.

Though the timetable for public release is now officially after the election, the date has stubbornly slipped since the panel voted to declassify a 500-page summary of the gargantuan report in April as Democrats push for fewer redactions to make the document more cogent. Wyden’s maneuver would be extremely time consuming, but the threat of its use previously forced the George W. Bush administration to release legal documents about interrogation techniques.

“I don’t want to have to do it,” Wyden said. “It should have been released yesterday.”

It also wouldn’t be worth much if Wyden is in the minority and the document is still in limbo come January. A Democratic loss would also shift power away from the Intelligence panel’s leading civil libertarians like Wyden, and Mark Udall of Colorado and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, both of whom have called for Brennan’s dismissal. Udall could lose reelection in November.

The Republican panel’s members are mostly on the other end of the spectrum, though at least two slots will open up with retirements. Some of the caucus’s rising stars like Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) have decidedly non-establishment views on data collection, drone use and the CIA’s relationship with the Senate, but they remain outliers. It’s unclear whether they will seek seats on the work-intensive committee as they mull runs for president.

“We just don’t have members who are going to be outspoken on that,” said a former GOP Senate Intelligence Committee aide of the CIA and NSA issues.

Civil liberty advocates are hanging their hat on the GOP’s libertarian movement creating bipartisan momentum on surveillance reform and on oversight of the CIA. Laura Murphy, who runs the American Civil Liberties Union’s Washington legislative office, said that surveillance reform seems likely to get a chillier reception under Republicans, who are also less concerned with allegations of CIA torture.

“The leadership of the CIA, Brennan and others, have been much cozier, kind of, with Bush administration policies,” she said. “These Republicans have had a history of, kind of, trusting the CIA more.”

Paul Pillar, a former CIA official and scholar at Georgetown University, agreed: “The Republicans overall seem to be more relaxed about the use of the techniques than the Democrats.”

While Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has not held votes on ending bulk data collection pitched by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Democrats view him as a staunch backer of Feinstein and aggressive supporter of declassification of the CIA report, as well as more inclined to force votes on NSA reform if 60 supportive votes ever materialize.

Momentum for ending the data collection program has slowed with the rise of Ebola and terrorist fears and could stagnate further under Republicans, though Murphy said Paul’s influence on McConnell could cause a sea change in the Senate. Still, influential Democrats like whip Dick Durbin of Illinois and president pro tempore Leahy have been more forceful on reigning in surveillance than anyone in GOP leadership.

Sen. Dan Coats (R-Ind.), who will be a senior Intel member next year, warned this week that “enacting major changes that diminish the very counterterrorism tools recommended by the 9/11 Commission will make our country less safe and more vulnerable.”

Brennan’s future and the CIA’s relationship with the Senate will still be difficult under Republicans, particularly after the eventual release of an interrogation report that’s expected to embarrass those involved in the interrogation program.

“Going to be a lot of fallout, it’s going to take a while for the CIA to even trust the committee again,” said a former GOP committee staffer.

The distrust is mutual — and even extends to some Republicans.

“The relationship is definitely strained and that’s a real problem,” said Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who’s expected to defeat a Democratic candidate running on a civil liberties platform. Asked if Brennan has soothed her concerns, Collins said no: “I don’t know what his reason is for not being more forthcoming, but I think it is damaging to his credibility as the leader of the CIA.”

Regardless of the electoral fallout, Intelligence Committee lawmakers have attempted to quarantine lingering controversies between the Hill and the administration, receiving regular updates from top administration officials per usual. But it sure would be easier without the distractions.

“Instead of trying to defend the indefensible, say: ‘We made a mistake, let’s move on, we’re not going to do it again.’ But now, we’re in this kind of tense situation, which is unfortunate and not good for the country,” said Sen. Angus King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats.