WASHINGTON - The Senate gave a strong boost yesterday to legal protections for telephone companies that helped the government conduct a warrantless wiretap program, dramatically increasing chances the legislation will survive a final vote next week.
In a lopsided 60-36 vote, the Senate rejected a proposal from the Senate Judiciary Committee that did not include immunity for the telecoms.
Instead, the Senate kept alive a competing proposal from the Senate intelligence committee that would offer legal protections to the companies and that has strong support from the White House.
The outcome increases the chance of an intraparty Democratic skirmish over the surveillance law, which would replace a stopgap measure passed last August that is due to expire in just eight days.
Senate majority leader Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, has asked President Bush to agree to a one-month extension, but Bush said in a statement yesterday that lawmakers must act quickly.
"Congress's action or lack of action on this important issue will directly affect our ability to keep Americans safe," Bush said.
In an apparent attempt to sway opinions in the House, the White House yesterday agreed to give members of the House intelligence and judiciary committees access to a set of secret records related to the warrantless wiretapping program.
Similar committees in the Senate had already been granted the same access last fall, according to legislative aides and other sources. House staff members immediately began examining the documents yesterday, sources said.
The temporary surveillance law, approved under heavy White House pressure, gives the government broad powers to eavesdrop on the communications of terrorism suspects without warrants. It effectively legalized many of the practices employed by the National Security Agency as part of a secret program approved by Bush in late 2001.
The White House and Republican lawmakers are pushing to make the law permanent while also adding legal protections for telecommunications companies, which face dozens of lawsuits. Most House Democrats and civil liberties groups strongly oppose immunity for the communications firms, but other Democrats - including Jay Rockefeller, chairman of the Senate intelligence committee - back the GOP position.
Some Democratic and Republican lawmakers have said they may put forward amendments providing more limited legal protections for the telecommunications companies, but the prospects for compromise are uncertain.
