WASHINGTON — The Bush administration on Tuesday launched its campaign to preserve and expand the USA Patriot Act, the much-debated anti-terrorism legislation enacted after Sept. 11.
In unusually strong language before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales defended the administration's use of the law and warned that any effort to dismantle it would be tantamount to "unilateral disarmament" in the war on terrorism.
The law, portions of which will expire at the end of the year unless Congress acts, has drawn opposition across the political spectrum, including civil liberties groups and libertarian conservatives concerned that it gives the government too much power to intrude into citizens' lives.
Gonzales said the government had used the act's most hotly debated sections dozens of times to investigate and prosecute terrorism and other crimes.
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III -- testifying at the same hearing -- argued for expanding the bureau's authority to issue administrative subpoenas in terrorism cases, something that would give it access to a wider range of data without having to go to court.
The FBI has that authority in cases that include drug trafficking, healthcare fraud and child exploitation, Mueller said. But Democratic lawmakers have rejected previous administration requests for broader subpoena authority.
Tuesday's action marked the beginning of what was expected to be a long and wrenching congressional review of how the Patriot Act operated in practice.
The law was enacted with broad bipartisan support six weeks after the 2001 terrorist attacks. Now, with the benefit of hindsight, Congress is about to engage in a debate that could last months. Sixteen of the act's provisions, including some that U.S. officials consider essential, are set to expire this year.
To critics, the law -- which made it easier for the government to investigate and prosecute suspected terrorists -- has become a symbol of the abuses immigrants and others have suffered since Sept. 11. But public opinion remains divided, in part because much of the Patriot Act has been shrouded in secrecy.
Some congressional Republicans, including Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, have expressed concerns about how the law has operated and indicated that they think revisions are needed.
At the hearing, Gonzales disclosed previously classified information showing how the government had used secret warrants obtained under the Patriot Act to amass a host of business and other personal records in terrorism investigations. The unusual public accounting, and Gonzales' embrace of what he called "technical modifications" in the law, seemed to be an attempt to strike a more conciliatory tone than his predecessor, John Ashcroft, whose support for the law was often viewed in Congress as unyielding.
The new attorney general has agreed to a private meeting to discuss the law with the American Civil Liberties Union, an audience that the group said it never got from Ashcroft.
"It is a grand departure from your predecessor," Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), a leading advocate of rolling back portions of the law, said at the hearing. "I think it is the right spirit."
At the same time, Durbin and others indicated that they did not think the changes Gonzales had embraced went far enough. Many of their concerns, while they may seem to be at the legal margins, could become stumbling blocks when it comes to enacting legislation later this year.
Committee members grilled Gonzales over such concerns as the standards the government used in obtaining a new form of search warrant that allowed authorities to delay notifying the target of an investigation, sometimes until weeks after the search had occurred. The authority for that type of warrant under the Patriot Act is one that does not expire this year, but has been targeted for repeal by critics of the act.
Gonzales said the delayed-notification provision -- known to critics as "sneak and peek" -- had been used 155 times in cases that included drug dealing, murder and terrorism. He said that represented less than 1% of all search warrants the department sought.
Others asked Gonzales about the sweeping way that the law defined terrorism, and about fears among some advocacy groups that they could face prosecution for staging protests that sought political change.
Some of the sharpest questioning came from Specter, who asked whether Gonzales would agree to limits on a provision in Section 215 of the law, targeted by library groups as possibly allowing the government to investigate the reading habits of ordinary citizens.
Gonzales told lawmakers that the government had used Section 215 on 35 occasions -- to obtain information about drivers' licenses, apartment leases and telephone subscribers but never against libraries.
