Dear _______,

​I am writing to you today to voice my concern about the role of the CIA in our government. While
congressional committees such as the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) and the
House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) are in place to oversee the CIA
and ensure that the organization's actions are legal and follow their mission to collect and
analyze intelligence, members of these committees do not currently have the tools and
information to do their jobs effectively. As a result, the CIA as an agency has been held
unaccountable for their use of torture, illegal drugs, and attempts to overthrow democratically
elected governments.

If the CIA is able to continue to operate without being held accountable by checks and balances,
there is no doubt in my mind that the agency will continue to plan and carry out operations with
similar levels of illegality as past projects put in motion by the CIA, such as the Bay of Pigs
invasion or the establishment of "black site" torture zones. These operations destabilize regions
across the globe as well as damage America's credibility on the world stage, and will continue to
do so the longer they are allowed to be performed.

I believe that the best way to ensure that congress is able to exercise sufficient oversight on the
CIA is by expanding the powers held by the SSCI and the HPSCI congressional committees.
Although the 9/11 commission, which referred to oversight on the CIA as "dysfunctional,"
recommended removing term limits on the congressional intelligence oversight committees in
2004, today only the SSCI has removed its term limits. Removing term limits on the HPSCI
would allow representatives on this committee to gain more experience working with intelligence
matters which would let them perform their job more efficiently.

​I also believe that as trusted representatives on the highest U.S. congressional bodies,
members of the SSCI and HPSCI should have further access to confidential information related
to CIA operations and more say as to whether or not these operations should take place. CIA
officials should be obliged to notify members of these committees before undergoing any covert
action, and members of these committees should have the power to veto covert action by a
majority vote from both bodies. This would allow the SSCI and HPSCI to view and potentially
prevent operations from the CIA that may be illegal, unethical, or damaging to U.S. global
interests.

​Many countries, including the United States, have already become a victim to the CIA's reckless
and rampant abuses of power. Therefore, I ask you today to take the steps to pass legislation
that would allow congress to perform their oversight duties effectively on the CIA and that would
force the CIA to operate within their stated goal, "to collect, analyze, evaluate, and disseminate
foreign intelligence to assist the President and senior US Government policymakers in making
decisions relating to national security."