For eight years, Kris served in the criminal division in the Office of the
U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. Kris became an associate deputy attorney general for national security issues in 2000. The
United States Senate confirmed Kris in a 97–0 vote on March 25, 2009.
Criticism of warrantless domestic wiretapping Kris attracted significant public attention when he released a 23-page legal memorandum, in his personal capacity, sharply criticizing the
George W. Bush administration's legal argument that it had authority to conduct
warrantless domestic wiretapping due to the
Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists passed by
Congress on September 18, 2001. Law professor
Marty Lederman called Kris's memo "by a large measure the most thorough and careful—and, for those reasons, the most devastating—critique anyone has offered of the DOJ argument that Congress statutorily authorized the NSA program." He also makes shorter arguments regarding the
Fourth Amendment implications of the warrantless domestic spying and the administration's "
unitary executive theory" of Article 2 of the
U.S. Constitution. Kris wrote the memorandum in January 2006, and released it to journalists on March 8, 2006. Kris had also exchanged a series of emails with
Courtney Elwood, an associate counsel to
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, debating the legal arguments, which were released by the
Electronic Privacy Information Center after obtaining them under the
Freedom of Information Act. Kris had been a high-ranking DOJ lawyer in the Bush administration for several years, and had appeared before Congress to advocate for the administration's positions regarding the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and the
USA PATRIOT Act. He had furthermore previously appeared before Congress in his personal capacity, after leaving the DOJ, to continue advocating for the government to have enhanced flexibility under FISA and the PATRIOT Act.
Later career In 2011, Kris joined
Intellectual Ventures as general counsel. == References ==