House Passes HR 6237 – FY 2018/19 Intel Authorization

Today the House passed  HR 6237, the Matthew Young Pollard Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Years 2018 and 2019, on a nearly party-line vote of 233 to 184 (6 Republican Noes and 9 Democrat Ayes). Twelve amendments were considered, but none were of specific interest to readers of this blog.

The bill has now been tossed to the Senate. Unfortunately, with the party-line vote in the House, there is not much of a chance that the Senate will take up the bill in its current form. There has not been a Senate version of the bill to substitute for the House language like we have seen in the spending bills, so that is probably not an option for consideration of HR 6237 in the Senate.

The intel community can survive without an authorization bill as long as the spending bills continue to pass. The big problem with the lack of authorization is that this reinforces the fact that Congress really has no stomach for maintaining oversight of the grey areas that surround the IC. Congress as a whole is perfectly content to allow a small number of Senators and Representatives to exercise the oversight out of sight and mind. Until, of course, something blows up….

See next post (Updated 07:30 EDT 7-13-18)