The US Senate Intelligence Committee has postponed a confirmation vote on John O Brennan as CIA director for at least two weeks as lawmakers ratcheted up pressure on the Obama administration to provide more information about its covert drone campaign against terrorism suspects.
Chairwoman of the panel, Dianne Feinstein on Wednesday said she was seeking seven Justice Department memos related to the administration’s targeted killing programme, in addition to four the committee had been allowed to view.
The Obama administration officials had reportedly expressed frustration over the demands and indicated that at least some of the memos the committee sought did not exist or were superseded by those the lawmakers had already seen.
The US drone policy has been widely criticised in media reports and recent studies. President Barack Obama pledged in his State of the Union address to make the lethal targeting programme “even more transparent to the American people and to the world”.
Brennan’s nomination has provided the Senate Intelligence Committee with leverage to press demands that it has made for the past two years for access to opinions on drone killings written by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel.
According to Feinstein’s office, the members have not had the 48 hours required under their procedures to review a complete transcript of a closed-door hearing they held with Brennan on Tuesday. Congress is in recess next week and will not return until the week of February 25.
Meanwhile, Senator Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, on Wednesday threatened to hold John Brennan’s nomination for CIA director unless he received more answers on the administration’s drone programme.
“I have asked Brennan if he believed that the president has the power to authorise lethal force, such as a drone strike, against a US citizen on US soil, and my question remains unanswered,” Paul said in a statement.
“I will not allow a vote on this nomination until Brennan openly responds to the questions and concerns my colleagues and I share.”