CAIRO, January 7, 2006 (IslamOnline.net) – US President George W. Bush has violated existing laws by authorizing warrantless eavesdropping on Americans and his justification depended on weak legal argument, according to a report by the Congress’s research arm, the first nonpartisan findings on the program to date.

A 44-page report by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) rebutted recent assertions by Bush and Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales about the president's authority to order secret intercepts of telephone and e-mail exchanges between people inside the United States and their contacts abroad, The Washington Post reported on Saturday, January 7.

It said the broad presidential powers granted to the US president in the wake of the 9/11 attacks did not authorize him to order the secret monitoring of calls made by US citizens, but authorized him to use military force when necessary to protect homeland security.

In the wake of the September 2001 attacks, Bush secretly authorized the National Security Agency (NSA) to intercept communications without court approval.

A 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), forbids domestic spying on US citizens without the approval of a special court.

Bush has defended an executive order he signed in 2002 allowing eavesdropping without warrants, saying it was limited only to monitoring international phone and e-mail communications linked to people with connections to Al-Qaeda.

But The New York Times reported in December that the NSA has "directly" tapped the country’s main communications systems without court-approved warrants.

It further revealed on January 1, 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.

"There begins to be a pattern of unilateral executive decision making," said Tobias.

The congressional report also concluded that Bush's defense of authorizing the spying was not "well-grounded."

"It appears unlikely that a court would hold that Congress has expressly or impliedly authorized the NSA electronic surveillance operations here," said the authors.

The Bush administration's legal justification "does not seem to be . . . well-grounded," they maintained.

Some law professors have been skeptical of Bush's assertions, and several said the report's conclusions were expected.

"Ultimately, the administration's position is not persuasive," Carl W. Tobias, a University of Richmond law professor and an expert on constitutional law, told the Post.

"Congress has made it pretty clear it has legislated pretty comprehensively on this issue with FISA," he said.

"And there begins to be a pattern of unilateral executive decision making. Time and again, there's the executive acting alone without consulting the courts or Congress."

Still, Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said the administration believes the program is on firm legal footing.

"The national security activities described by the president were conducted in accord with the law and provide a critical tool in the war on terror that saves lives and protects civil liberties at the same time."

The CRS findings prompted Democratic lawmakers and civil liberties advocates to repeat calls for Congress to conduct hearings on the controversial spying program and attempt to halt it.

"This report contradicts the president's claim that his spying on Americans was legal," said Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), one of the lawmakers who asked the CRS to research the issue.

"It looks like the president's wiretapping was not only illegal, but also ensnared innocent Americans who did nothing more than place a phone call."

Democratic and Republican lawmakers -- chiefly Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.); chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee -- pledged Friday to conduct Congressional hearings on the monitoring program, the Post said.

Last week, Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky called for an inquiry into the incident.