The Washington Post’s Ellen Nakashima reports that telecom companies are providing the FBI with “transactional data”—the time, duration and parties involved in a phone conversation.  The law enforcement agency is then sharing that information with intelligence agencies such as the CIA and National Security Agency.

How does this program exactly work and what steps are in place to ensure the FBI doesn’t just ask telecoms for all their information? One issue that Nakashima focuses on is whether the FBI is simply receiving information from the telecoms or is already tapped into the telecom’s data system. The transactional data collection is but part of the of the unresolved problem of FISA re-authorization. Read Nakashima here. MB

The Justice Department under new Attorney General Michael Mukasey is up to old its tricks. The Washington Post’s Carrie Johnson reports that justice has still yet to produce the key legal documents that underpinned its warrantless wiretapping program and the procedure for treating Guantanamo Bay detainees.

Pat Leahy (D-Vt.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said Mukasey has been a “slight improvement” in producing documents compared with disgraced AG Alberto Gonzales. But Justice contends that they’re not uncooperative—they’re just understaffed and overwhelmed by all of Congress’s requests. Given that the federal bureaucracy is generally understaffed and overwhelmed there could be a little truth in that. Maybe. Read Johnson here. MB

The Washington Post’s Spencer S. Hsu flags the efforts by 14 Democrats, including eight chairman of Congressional committees, to stop building 470 miles of fence along the U.S-Mexico border. Building the remaining fence would result in the Department of Homeland Security violating 30 environmental laws. These are some rather, um, insensitive provsions to be violating in the name of keeping Mexicans out—they include the Indian Burial Restoration Act and many other laws implemented to protect native land. Read Hsu here. MB