David Welna

Perhaps the most controversial spying program revealed by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden was the agency's hoarding of Americans' phone records.

Congress wants to change that program.

The House has passed legislation that would end the NSA's bulk collection of Americans' calling data and let phone companies ...

With criticism mounting on Capitol Hill of a prisoner swap that traded 5 jailed Taliban leaders for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, some military, intelligence and diplomatic officials briefed senators.

Lawmakers don't much like the deal, which traded five Taliban fighters held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl. They are also mad about how it was done behind their backs.

A year after President Obama urged for more safeguards for civil liberties in intelligence collection, the House passed new guidelines. But civil liberties watchdogs say they no longer support it.

Lawmakers passed a bill ending the NSA's practice of collecting phone records of Americans. Instead, phone companies would hold the data and the NSA would face additional legal barriers to search it.

Faced with tight budget requirements, the Pentagon wants to retire the jet fighters known as tank-killers for their ability to attack enemy forces at close range. Lawmakers want to keep the warthogs.

It's been well over a month since the Senate Intelligence Committee voted 11 to 3 to declassify and make public the executive summary and findings of its "Torture Report."

But it's not likely that will actually happen anytime soon.

The reason? The CIA — the very agency skewered in the ...

The Pentagon's congressionally-imposed budget cuts ran into a powerful opponent this week: Congress itself. The House Armed Services Committee rejected $5 billion worth of proposed cuts.

The White House and members of Congress agree that the National Security Agency's bulk collection of Americans' phone logs, disclosed by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, has to end.

Washington has imposed a number of economic sanctions on Russia in retaliation for that country's push into Ukraine.

Getting European allies to do the same has not always been easy, since many of those nations trade with Russia and fear getting hurt themselves.

But the Europeans are not the only ...

The Pentagon issued a study on sexual assault in the military, reports of which have jumped 50 percent in the past year. Defense Secretary Hagel says this is a positive sign of trust in the system.

The military's reliance on cyberspace is outpacing its ability to defend against cyberattacks, according to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. Here's how cyberwarriors are being trained.

During a hearing Tuesday, Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy vented anger about a USAID program to fund a failed, Twitter-like network in Cuba.

The Senate Intelligence Committee has voted to ask the CIA to declassify portions of a committee report detailing the agency's interrogation of terrorism suspects after Sept. 11, 2001.

The three leading candidates in Afghanistan's presidential election are all urbane, Westernized men who usually wear suits. Yet their running mates range from notorious warlords to a woman.

Citing millions of dollars spent already, Democrats argue politics is not a good reason to spend millions more investigating the attack on the U.S. diplomatic outpost in Libya more than a year ago.

Congress has approved a billion-dollar aid package for Ukraine. Both chambers voted in favor, two days after Senate Democrats removed a provision to overhaul the International Monetary Fund.

The best-known symbol of the nation's capital is literally cracking up: The cast-iron dome crowning the U.S. Capitol has more than 1,300 cracks below its layers of lead paint.

House Republicans are proposing a limit on the National Security Agency's phone records program. President Obama also repeated support for having phone companies keep the records, rather than the NSA.

When Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid declared "I support Senator Feinstein unequivocally" the same day she thrashed the CIA on the Senate floor, the question of whether the pugilistic top congressional Democrat from Nevada would leap into that fight seemed less a matter of if than when.

A little more ...