Obama to nominate wiretapping critic for critical DoJ post

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Yesterday we wrote that Leon Panetta’s nomination to direct the CIA is part of a broader effort by US President Elect Barack Obama to reestablish governmental “oversight over the intelligence community, which […] was effectively terminated [after] 9/11”. Now rumors of yet another nomination come to support the view of a broader plan by Barack Obama “to depart from some of the most controversial legal policies of the Bush administration”. The President Elect is shortly expected to nominate David Kris, a former national security legal adviser in the Department of Justice, to lead the DoJ’s National Security Division. The Division was established in 2006 to oversee intelligence activities by US government agencies relating to counterespionage and counterterrorism. Kris, who was among Hillary Clinton’s national security advisers during her presidential nomination campaign, has been offering his services to Barack Obama’s transition team for the past two months. In legal circles he is known for his fierce criticism of NSA’s project STELLAR WIND, a warrantless domestic surveillance scheme initiated after 9/11. Kris’s rumored nomination will come less than a week after the nomination of Dr. Dawn Johnsen to head the Office of Legal Counsel –the foremost legal adviser to the President and all agencies in the US government’s executive branch. Dr. Johnsen is among the earliest opponents of NSA’s warrantless wiretapping program and of the use of torture in interrogations, among other controversial issues.