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Jul. 14, 2003. WIRED magazine reports that the controversial Terrorism Information Awareness program is likely to have its funding cut.

The Senate's $368 billion version of the 2004 defense appropriations bill, released from committee to the full Senate last week, contains a provision that would deny all funds to, and thus would effectively kill, the Terrorism Information Awareness program, formerly known as Total Information Awareness. TIA's projected budget for 2004 is $169 million.

Critics have called TIA an attempt to impose Big Brother on Americans. Wired describes TIA this way: "The program would use advanced data-mining tools and a mammoth database to find patterns of terrorist activities in electronic data trails left behind by everyday life."

The Senate bill's language is simple but comprehensive: "No funds appropriated or otherwise made available to the Department of Defense ... or to any other department, agency or element of the Federal Government, may be obligated or expended on research and development on the Terrorism Information Awareness program."

The Senate likely will vote on and pass the bill early next week as lawmakers hope to send the spending bill to the White House before Congress recesses in August.

After the Senate votes, the provision's fate will be decided by a joint committee, which will reconcile the Senate's bill with the House version. The House version contains no explicit provision to deny funds to TIA. But Congress watchers say opponents of the TIA likely will succeed in killing it.

Here is the full story in Wired.

Also, see a similar story in USA Today, July 16, 2003, entitled Move in Senate to kill wide-ranging surveillance program.

The Bush administration is opposing this move.

"This provision would deny an important potential tool in the war on terrorism," said the statement of administration policy, issued by the president's Office of Management and Budget this week.

"The administration urges the Senate to remove the provision that prohibits any research and development for the Terrorism Information Awareness [TIA] program," the statement said.

The language is contained in the defense spending bill for fiscal 2004 and the Senate is expected to vote on the full bill this week. A similar version passed the House 399-19 on July 8.

The Senate version differs from the House version, which does not eliminate spending, so the final language will not be determined until a single bill is hammered out in a conference committee.

A staffer for the House Appropriations Committee said full funding was not axed because some lawmakers felt it was "worth at least exploring for the potential element of intelligence gathering with restraints."

See http://washingtontimes.com/national/20030715-114942-2412r.htm