Bush defends eavesdropping amid calls for testimony
President George W. Bush defended domestic eavesdropping by the National Security Agency on Sunday after a newspaper report about a Justice Department official's resistance to the program prompted new calls for a Senate inquiry. The New York Times reported on Sunday that James Comey, a deputy to then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, was concerned about the legality of the NSA program and refused to extend it in 2004. White House aides then turned to Ashcroft while the attorney general was hospitalized for gallbladder surgery, the Times said. "This is a limited program designed to prevent attacks on the United States of America," Bush said after visiting wounded troops at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. The NSA program "listens to a few numbers called from the outside of the United States and of known al Qaeda or affiliate people," he said. "If somebody from al Qaeda is calling you, we'd like to know why," Bush said. White House spokes...
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