Audio Minnesota's senators differ on Sept. 11 report (story audio) Listen to Sen. Dayton's comments Sen. Coleman questions the commission co-chairs Photos Senate hearing on 9/11 report More from MPR Sept. 11 report: 'A failure of imagination' (07/22/2004) Resources Sept. 11 Commission Your Voice Join the conversation with other MPR listeners in the News Forum.

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Minnesota's senators differ on Sept. 11 report
by Laura McCallum, Minnesota Public Radio
July 30, 2004

Thomas Kean, left, and Lee Hamilton, the leaders of the 9/11 Commission, testified during a hearing of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Friday. Both of Minnesota's U.S. senators serve on that committee, but differed in their reactions to the report. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images)

Minnesota's two U.S. senators Friday weighed in on the the findings of the Sept. 11 Commission report. Republican Norm Coleman and Democrat Mark Dayton spoke at the first congressional hearing on the report. Dayton said the report shows an utter failure by the federal government to protect American lives, and an attempt to cover up mistakes after the 2001 terrorist attacks. Coleman says he generally supports the commission's recommendations.

Washington, D.C. — The 567-page report is a nationwide bestseller -- and Dayton says he couldn't put it down. He skipped some parties at the Democratic National Convention this week, and stayed up until 4 a.m. one day to finish it.

The bipartisan commission's 19-month investigation found numerous intelligence failures leading up to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people. Dayton says he was outraged by the report's findings, which highlight flaws in the federal government's policies and capabilities.

"What I find much more shocking and alarming were the repeated and catastrophic failures of the leaders in charge, and the other people responsible, to do their jobs," Dayton says. "To follow established procedures. To follow direct orders from civilian and military commanders. And then they failed to tell us the truth later."

Dayton says he was particularly disturbed by what he described as negligence by the Federal Aviation Administration in failing to call for military backup when terrorists hijacked four planes. He read a transcript detailing a conversation between FAA officials about the fourth plane, which was headed for Washington, D.C.

"Command center - 'Uh, do we want to, uh, think about scrambling aircraft?' - FAA headquarters - 'Oh God, I don't know.' - Command center - 'Uh, that's a decision somebody's going to have to make probably in the next 10 minutes.' - FAA headquarters - 'Uh, yeah, you know, everybody just left the room,'" Dayton read from the report. "At 10:03, United flight 93 crashed into Pennsylvania farm soil, and nobody from the FAA headquarters had contacted the military."

What I find much more shocking and alarming were the repeated and catastrophic failures of the leaders in charge, and the other people responsible, to do their jobs. - Sen. Mark Dayton, D-Minn.

That plane carried Minnesota native Tom Burnett Jr. Dayton also blasted officials with NORAD - the military agency charged with protecting the nation's airspace - and accused them of lying to cover up their mistakes on Sept. 11. He called on President Bush to fire any federal officials who made false statements to the 9/11 commission.

Minnesota's Republican Senator, Norm Coleman, also serves on the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee which held the hearing. Coleman says the report shows an inability by federal officials to grasp what was happening as the nation was under attack.

Coleman asked commission chair Tom Kean, a former Republican governor of New Jersey, if the report blames senior Bush administration officials, such as the heads of the FBI and CIA, or National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. Kean said no one person was to blame.

"The sense of urgency is there, but the sense of urgency must be extended, magnified, made an important part," Kean responded. "The last presidential campaign, we had all these warnings -- all the way from World Trade Center One through Black Hawk Down, which Bin Laden was part of, to all the attacks abroad and at home -- the ones that were stopped and the ones that succeeded -- all that laid out. We went through all the rhetoric of the last presidential campaign. Terrorism was mentioned only once."

Coleman says he generally supports the commission's recommendations for a new national intelligence director and a new counterterrorism center, although he questioned whether there might be interim gaps if the new structure is created.

The commission's vice chairman, former Democratic Congressman Lee Hamilton, says there are risks involved in creating a new intelligence structure. But he says the risk of not restructuring is greater, because the current system isn't working. Coleman cautioned that there is no silver bullet for fighting terrorism, and no one can promise there won't be any more terrorist attacks.

President Bush has created a working group to study the commission's recommendations and suggest which ones he could put into effect through executive order, while Democrat John Kerry has called on Bush to immediately implement the 9/11 report's recommendations.

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