Political Quotes

“Yesterday, I rose to explain my opposition to the nomination of Joshua Rudd to be the Director of the National Security Agency and to lead Cyber Command. During his hearing, General Rudd failed to demonstrate a bare minimum understanding of the constitutional limits on NSA activities. His responses to questions about privacy rights and transparency were deeply troubling. He wouldn't commit to the Agency's past policy of not purchasing and using very sensitive location data on Americans, and he wouldn't rule out secretly violating public policies and guardrails on NSA activities. While I admire the nominee's many years of military service, he does not have a background in national signals intelligence activities or cyber operations that would qualify him for this position. Now, he is not the first unqualified nominee. In fact, there are currently no qualified, Senate-confirmed officials in charge of cyber security. The country faces serious cyber security threats. This is truly a five-alarm fire. Yet the President keeps nominating officials to key cyber security roles who have less knowledge of the topic than an undergraduate computer science major. General Rudd is the wrong person for the job, and I oppose his nomination. But if the Senate confirms General Rudd despite his lack of familiarity with basic constitutional principles, it is all the more essential--truly important--that the Senate pass legislation to protect against surveillance abuses.”