◆ SpookStack

And IJ do think it’s incumbent upon the FBI to go back and look and see exactly what people were doing, at what stages, and why they did what they did, and take appropriate action to hold people accountable. CONYERS: Now, do you make a distinction between the national security letters and the exigent letters in Lerms of the severity of the offense that brings us here today? FINE: I do, I think the exigent letters were the most troubling aspect of this. CONYERS: And why is that? FINE: Because there's a process in the law to allow voluntary disclosures from these telephone companies if there is a true emergency. And we believe the FBI should have followed that voluntary process. Instead, they went with these exigent letters, which they use in a different context, and applied it to this context, which, in our view, was inappropriate. With regard to the national security letters, there were many of them, and many of them did comply with the requirements of the law we saw. And we tried to do a review to see how many didn't. We found a significant number didn't. But with regard to the exigent letters as a whole, that whole practice was very troubling to us in and of itself. CONYERS: Now, are you salisfted with the steps that have been described here today by the general counsel in terms of how we clean this mess up? FINE: Well, we have been briefed by the department and the FBI about the steps they're taking. I think they are taking this seriously. But I'm not in a position right now to say, "I'm completely satisfied, I trust all this." We need to see what happens with these steps, see whether they're concerted efforts over time, to see whether they really are adequately implemented. So I can't say right now that it is -- they’ve done all they can. FINE: But | think they are taking important steps and taking this very seriously. CONYERS: All right. Thank you so much. And I recognize Jamar Smith.