Silvestre Reyes

Deal in the Works for FISA Law?

Andrew Tilghman | June 4, 2008, 3:28PM

House Intelligence Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) may have agreed to a compromise on a deal to rewrite the nation's electronic surveillance laws.

A report in Congress Daily says Reyes is "fine" with the Republican-brokered deal that would "leave it up to the secret FISA court to grant retroactive legal immunity" to telecoms that helped the Bush administration's warrantless conduct surveillance on U.S. citizens.

But an aide for Reyes appeared to backpedal, saying Reyes still supported a proposal being pushed by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) to shift the decision-making about immunity from the secret FISA courts to traditional federal courts.

John Murtha

Money in, Money out: Lobby Shop Works Dems

Paul Kiel | October 1, 2007, 11:16AM

Sometimes you've just gotta admire a well-oiled machine.

The PMA Group, headed by a former aide to Rep. John Murtha (D-PA), have long had a simple system. Clients pump hundreds of thousands into his campaign committee, and Rep. Murtha uses his legendary porkbarreling skills to ensure PMA's clients get their millions. It worked fine while Murtha was still in the minority, and it's working great now.

Roll Call totaled (sub. req.) up the damage last month:

-- Murtha's defense appropriations subcommittee recently passed its 2008 bill. PMA clients came away with 36 earmarks -- one-third of the total projects in the bill -- worth a total of $100.5 million.

-- The three lawmakers on Murtha's committee responsible for earmarking that money -- Reps. Murtha, Jim Moran (D-VA) and Pete Visclosky (D-IN) -- are getting the expected support from PMA clients, who donated $542,350 in the first six months of this year, or 26 percent of the trio's total fundraising. Everybody's back got scratched.

And today, Roll Call reports that House intelligence committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) is getting in on the act:

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Silvestre Reyes

CQ: Senior Dem Backs 30K More Troops in Iraq

Justin Rood | December 9, 2006, 9:41AM

In an interview with Congressional Quarterly, incoming House intelligence committee chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) said he could support boosting American troop levels in Iraq by 30,000 to subdue the warring militias -- though it's not clear he understands who's fighting who, or how more troops would get them to stop:

. . . Reyes says he favors sending more troops [to Iraq].

“If it’s going to target the militias and eliminate them, I think that’s a worthwhile investment,” he said.

It’s hard to find anybody in Iraq who thinks the U.S. can do that.

On “a temporary basis, I’m willing to ramp them up by twenty or thirty thousand . . . for, I don’t know, two months, four months, six months — but certainly that would be an exception,” Reyes said.

Despite this commitment, Reyes was hard-pressed to explain to CQ's national security editor Jeff Stein some of the basics of the region's radicalism, such as whether al Qaeda was Sunni or Shia (answer: very Sunni), and Stein seems nonplussed by the scope of Reyes' understanding of the many factions fighting the country's civil war.

Silvestre Reyes

Eyebrows Raised over Reyes' Ties to Troubled Contractor

Justin Rood | December 4, 2006, 9:05AM

The melee over who would be the next House intelligence committee chairman made our head spin. In fact, in our excitement over Reps. Alcee Hastings (D-FL) and Jane Harman (D-CA), we all but overlooked a bit of muck that attached itself to the man who was tapped to fill the post.

But the Washington Post helpfully reminded us on Saturday of a scandal from last year which threatened to tarnish the reputation of Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-TX), the former border patrol agent and Vietnam gunner whom House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi has chosen to lead the intel panel.

Shortly after getting elected to Congress in 1996, Reyes began pushing for a pricey program to install surveillance cameras along the northern and southern U.S. borders. He also pushed for a certain business, International Microwave Corp., to win that contract, according to the Post, who broke the story in April 2005. The paper gave no details on how Reyes is said to have supported the company's bid.

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