The Washington Examiner offers the following report about North Carolina’s senior U.S. senator:
The staff of Sen. Richard Burr, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is reportedly looking into whether Ted Cruz disclosed classified information about the USA Freedom Act during last night’s debate.
The Texas senator and rival Republican Sen. Marco Rubio engaged in a heated discussion of the United States’ surveillance capabilities and foreign policies, and Cruz may have let slip some classified information.
“The USA Freedom Act expands that so now we have cell phones, now we have Internet phones, now we have the phones that terrorists are likely to use and the focus of law enforcement is on targeting the bad guys,” Cruz said. “What [Rubio] knows is that the old program covered 20 percent to 30 percent of phone numbers to search for terrorists. The new program covers nearly 100 percent. That gives us greater ability to stop acts of terrorism, and he knows that that’s the case.”
Rubio responded and said the speakers needed to be cautious.
“Let me be very careful when answering this, because I don’t think national television in front of 15 million people is the place to discuss classified information. So let me just be very clear. There is nothing that we are allowed to do under this bill that we could not do before,” Rubio said.
Becca Glover Watkins, communications director for Burr, tweeted shortly after the exchange: “Cruz shouldn’t have said that.”
