In September 1998, Deitz left a
partner position in private practice at the Washington, D.C. office of international law firm
Perkins Coie to return to public service to head the Office of the
General Counsel, or D2 at the
National Security Agency, responsible for representing the agency in all legal matters. During his stint at
NSA, Deitz variously held concurrent
dual-hat positions as acting
General Counsel at the
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and acting Deputy
General Counsel, Intelligence, at the
Department of Defense. While at
NSA the agency's legal burdens were heavily focused on the
warrantless surveillance programs later
exposed by Edward Snowden in 2013. On Snowden's allegations that while at NSA officers "at any time can target anyone, any selector, anywhere,” or "wiretap anyone from you or your accountant to a federal judge to even the president if I had a personal email”, Deitz called the claim a “complete and utter” falsehood. In the
Los Angeles Times, Deitz said "First of all it’s illegal, there is enormous oversight. They have keystroke auditing. There are, from time to time, cases in which some analyst is [angry] at his ex-wife and looks at the wrong thing and he is caught and fired” Deitz left the
NSA with
Director Michael Hayden in September 2006 to follow his boss to the
Central Intelligence Agency, where Hayden became
Director, and Deitz served as Senior Counselor to the Director. == Academia ==