This week marks the 50th anniversary of the Senate’s adoption of Senate Resolution 400 of 1976 (S.Res. 400), creating the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI). The SSCI has worked better than most committees in terms of passing legislation and retaining bipartisanship much of the time, but a 50th anniversary is an apt time to look at lessons learned and possible new directions.
Propelled by the Watergate scandal and especially by revelations of abuses in covert actions and the FBI’s COINTELPRO program that infiltrated antiwar and civil rights groups, the Senate recognized the shortfall in its laissez faire approach to intelligence oversight. From the creation of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1947 until the creation of the SSCI, essentially three or four Senators conducted intelligence oversight via the Senate Armed Services Committee. FBI oversight, also fleeting, was conducted by the Senate Judiciary Committee. The attitude of Senators in those days was best characterized by Sen. Leverett Saltonstall, the senior Republican on Armed Services, who said:
…it is not a question of reluctance on the part of the CIA officials to speak to us. Instead, it is a question of our reluctance, if you will, to seek information and knowledge on subjects which I personally, as a Member of Congress and as a citizen, would rather not have, unless I believed it to be my responsibility to have it because it might involve the lives of American citizens.
The SSCI, and its House companion – the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), created in 1977 – have endured. Intelligence oversight is a long-established fact of life for Congress and for the Intelligence Community.
How SSCI Operates
S.Res. 400 epitomized the checks and balances required to achieve public policy effectiveness and democratic accountability. The term “select” derives from the fact that the leader of each party caucus hand-picked committee members. The majority was granted a single vote margin irrespective of the chamber’s balance of power between the two major parties in order to lean heavily in favor of bipartisanship. Moreover, the ranking minority member of the SSCI is designated as the Vice Chair, and takes over hearings and other business in the absence of the Chair. Additionally, the Committee budget was allocated by a 60 to 40 percent margin regardless of the number of staff on payroll. These features forced consensus building across the aisle, something largely absent today in Congress.
S.Res. 400 also required two members from each of the armed services, foreign relations, judiciary, and appropriations committees to also serve as members of SSCI given their involvement in intelligence activities. The caucus leaders were designated ex officio members to ensure it reflected bipartisan leadership priorities. The resolution granted the committee exclusive jurisdiction over the CIA and the Director of Central Intelligence (since replaced by the Director of National Intelligence), but otherwise jurisdiction was shared with another committee.
The SSCI has passed intelligence authorization acts in each of its 50 years of existence except five. This is no small feat, which only the Senate Armed Services Committee has been able to replicate or exceed with what is considered an annual must-pass piece of legislation, the National Defense Authorization Act. The SSCI has considered presidential nominees for top-level positions, including Director of CIA and the Director of National Intelligence. It has enacted legislation to protect whistleblower rights for intelligence community employees, and conducted numerous ground-breaking investigations, which have involved intelligence gaps and failures, misuse or abuse of intelligence, and misconduct within the intelligence community. A few notable examples have included investigations into Saddam Hussein’s arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, the CIA’s so-called Rendition, Detention, and Interrogation (RDI) program, and Russia’s efforts to interfere with the 2020 presidential election.
More than anything else, the SSCI has usually been an island of bipartisan comity amidst a sea of partisan bickering. It is a role model for the kind of mature oversight and legislative work that our Founders had strived to achieve and what citizens expect of the United States Senate.
SSCI has achieved this unusually high level of productivity and frequent bipartisanship in part thanks to its initial structure as provided in S.Res 400, and also because the Senate leadership on both sides of the aisle have been careful about who is appointed to the committee. From the beginning in 1976, it was understood that reliable oversight of intelligence would be a test of the Senate’s competence and reliability as an institution in dealing with this extremely important and sensitive area.
That said, SSCI’s work has not been without controversy and occasional partisanship. For example, in 2009, the SSCI decided to review the controversial RDI program. The Republican members withdrew from this effort, which was then conducted by only the Democratic staff.
Reforms at the 50-Year Mark to Ensure Continued Impact
Turning 50 is an appropriate juncture to consider reforms to ensure continued relevance and impact. We propose eight:
1. Allocate floor time for the IAA: The Senate should guarantee floor time to consider the annual intelligence authorization act (IAA). For the past decade, the IAA has instead been attached to the National Defense Authorization Act to minimize political debate over sensitive matters and ensure passage. There are parts of the bill that can be debated in public. This would improve transparency and increase public support for the overall process.
2. Focus on emerging technology: The Committee should reaffirm its role in defining and shaping the policy framework for emerging technologies. Multiple congressional committees have an interest in drone, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, fusion energy, and other newer industries that span the civilian and military domains. SSCI has accrued the necessary expertise and acumen to navigate such matters from a national, bipartisan perspective. The rapid adoption of AI and the changed nature of warfare as seen in Ukraine are two examples of issues that would benefit from this increased SSCI input.
3. Incorporate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Members: The Committee should explicitly include two members of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation committee, which share jurisdiction in science, technology and aspects of engineering.
4. Increase knowledge and rigor on matters of war and peace: More broadly, the Committee should reaffirm its role as providing intelligence for other committees on important questions of peace and war. The SSCI already serves as the reviewer of arms control treaties to determine how well they can be monitored. During armed conflicts, the committee should maintain diligent oversight of the role intelligence is playing, identifying possible shortfalls and recommending timely remedies.
The SSCI can also sponsor intelligence briefings on topics of international consequence such as international counternarcotics trafficking, nuclear weapons proliferation risks, and the like, before the foreign relations and armed services committees take up proposals for military deployments or the use of military force. These joint sessions would also increase cross-committee knowledge and foster better working methods where multiple committees have jurisdiction over sensitive matters.
5. Increase public transparency: The Committee should enhance its commitment to make intelligence more accessible to the public. At present, there are only a few mechanisms whereby Congress shares its work beyond its classified walls. It holds a single unclassified hearing on the annual threat assessment, and holds public hearings on the handful of officials requiring Senate confirmation. The SSCI could also hold hearings on topics like foreign malign influence or the global role of social media companies in shaping international public opinion.
6. Adjust relationship with Armed Services on oversight: The Committee should seek to adapt its relationship with Senate Armed Services to be more in line with HPSCI’s relationship with the House Armed Services Committee, to afford the SSCI better oversight over the defense intelligence programs, which account for the vast majority of the Intelligence Community’s budget and people. Gaps in jurisdiction between the two committees inevitably create gaps in oversight that lead to failure.
7. Read in foreign relations committees on covert action: The Committee should seek access to covert action for the leadership of the foreign relations committee given its jurisdiction over decisions about broader U.S. foreign policy.
8. Increase legislative transparency: The Committee should bring more transparency to its legislative work. The committees could sponsor analysis on transnational challenges like cybersecurity, foreign malign influence, and infrastructure integrity that is publicly releasable. As former NSA and CIA Director Michael Hayden has noted, some level of transparency is necessary to maintain public support, which translates in part to sending people to Congress who will be supportive of U.S. intelligence.
Each of these can be accomplished through the Senate’s own procedures. Amidst the current atmosphere of politicization of oversight and legislation, the Senate can capitalize on the success of the SSCI and take steps to make it relevant and even more effective for its next 50 years.
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Author’s Note: All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed are those of the authors and do not reflect the official positions or views of the U.S. Government. Nothing in the contents should be construed as asserting or implying U.S. Government authentication of information or endorsement of the authors’ views.
