§3091 General Congressional Oversight Provisions

Summary

The President must keep the congressional intelligence committees fully and up-to-date about U.S. intelligence work, including major planned actions the law says must be reported. The law does not make committee approval a required step before starting those planned actions. If illegal intelligence activity happens, the President must quickly tell the committees and explain what was or will be done to fix it. The President and the intelligence committees must each write down the procedures they need to follow. The House and the Senate must make rules to protect classified information and secrets about intelligence sources and methods when that information is given to the committees or to Members of Congress. They must work with the Director of National Intelligence on those rules. No one may refuse to give information to the committees by claiming it would improperly share classified information or source-and-method secrets. “Intelligence activities” includes covert actions (see section 3093(e)) and financial intelligence activities.