(CNN) - In a hearing Tuesday with the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, the director of the National Security Agency, Keith Alexander, said that since 9/11, there have been more than 50 terror plots thwarted with the help of NSA surveillance programs.
Four of those incidents were detailed at the hearing, including thwarted plots to bomb the New York subway system and the New York Stock Exchange by linking known suspects in Pakistan and Yemen to contacts in the United States.
NSA officials are set to disclose information about the other cases in a private session with lawmakers on Wednesday.
Still, there is a debate within the intelligence community about what can be revealed to prove these programs work versus what should stay classified for fear of burning sources and methods.
Check back here for updates from the hearing.
(CNN) – NSA Director Keith Alexander is expected to reveal two terror plots that the agency will say were thwarted with the help of the recently disclosed secret surveillance programs, a congressional source tells CNN.
Alexander is expected to make the announcement at Tuesday House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence hearing.
Last week, Alexander said that these programs helped foil dozens of terror plots - but he offered no specific details.
Still, there is a debate within the intelligence community about what can be revealed to prove these programs work versus what should stay classified for fear of burning sources and methods.
Washington (CNN) - House Republican leaders are hoping to head off a repeat of last week's controversy over the issue of whether there should be an exception for cases of rape and incest in a GOP sponsored bill banning late term abortions by adding that exception before the House debates the measure on Tuesday.
Republican members on the House Judiciary committee, which marked up the abortion bill last week, voted down a Democratic amendment to allow women who are raped to obtain an abortion beyond 22 weeks into a pregnancy. But House GOP leaders decided to add a slightly different exception to the bill after several GOP members expressed concerns about the issue, according to two House Republican leadership aides. The new language permits an exception for those women who get pregnant through rape or incest to obtain an abortion if they report the crime to the authorities first.
FULL POST
(CNN) – A congressman from Texas had quite the scare after choking on a piece of popcorn the other day.
Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, was eating Thursday at the Capitol Hill Club–a Republican hangout in Washington–when the popcorn became lodged in his throat, his spokeswoman, Shaylyn Hynes, confirmed Monday.
FULL POST
Washington (CNN) – Attorney General Eric Holder will send the House Judiciary Committee additional information next week to clarify his earlier testimony about reporters and leak investigations, according to Republican leaders of the panel.
Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Virginia, and Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wisconsin, said Friday in a statement that Holder has agreed to respond to specific questions the Republicans submitted to him at the end of May. A committee aide told CNN that Holder is supposed to submit his answers in writing by Wednesday, June 19.
FULL POST
(CNN) – Motown came to Congress Thursday at a celebration for longtime Rep. John Dingell, who recently became the longest-serving U.S. lawmaker in history.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Dingell's wife, Debbie, stole the show when they joined vocalist Mary Wilson as her backup singers and dancers for a performance of "Stop in the Name of Love" by The Supremes.
FULL POST
(CNN) - Rep. Trent Franks, R-Arizona, said he was taken out of context Wednesday and tried to clarify his controversial comment from a committee markup earlier in the day, when he said the "incidents of rape resulting in pregnancy are very low."
Franks intended to say that the number of abortions due to rape after the start of the sixth month of gestation would be low, not the number of rapes resulting in pregnancy.
FULL POST
Washington (CNN) - House members from both political parties Tuesday raised concerns and tough questions for administration officials who briefed the entire chamber on the government's recently revealed top secret surveillance programs.
While Peter King, a Republican member of the House Homeland Security Committee, complimented the briefing team, some of his colleagues said some questions remain unanswered.
FULL STORY (CNN) – Some House Republicans who voted last week to end President Barack Obama's deportation rule will get hit with new Spanish language radio ads in their districts over the next week.
Spending five figures on the ad buy, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is targeting nine members who voted for an amendment that would defund a program that allows some young undocumented immigrants to defer deportation.
FULL POST
Washington (CNN) - Rep. John Dingell is making history, as he becomes the longest serving member of Congress in the nation's history.
On Friday, the Democrat from Michigan will have served 57 years, five months, and 26 days, breaking the record held by the late Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia.
FULL POST
From CNN Politics
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
Recent Comments