Citing a New York Daily News article, 9News at 10 p.m. co-anchor Bob Kendrick on January 4 uncritically reported that a so-called “signing statement” attached to a postal reform bill had given President Bush “new authority” to “open your mail without a judge's order.” Kendrick reported the comments of a White House spokesman who claimed that warrantless mail searches are “nothing new,” but omitted the article's reporting of arguments to the contrary. Kendrick also failed to note that, according to the Daily News article, Bush's latest use of a signing statement has drawn widespread criticism from “civil libertarians, veteran law enforcement agents and lawmakers,” and that the Republican sponsor of the postal reform bill, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, has questioned the signing statement.

From the January 4 broadcast of KUSA's 9News at 10 p.m.:

KENDRICK: Presidents can now open your mail without a judge's order. According to the New York Daily News, President Bush asserted his new authority after signing a postal reform bill into law before Christmas. He issued a “signing statement” declaring his right to open domestic mail under emergency conditions to gather intelligence. A White House spokesman says it's nothing new; that in certain circumstances, the Constitution does not require warrants for reasonable searches.

But according to the January 5 Daily News article that Kendrick cited, “The Republican sponsor of a postal reform bill called on President Bush yesterday to explain why he used it to claim he can open domestic mail without a search warrant.” According to the Daily News:

Sen. Susan Collins of Maine questioned Bush's controversial Dec. 20 “signing statement” in which he stated if there were an emergency he wouldn't need a warrant to open letters. The bill he signed into law that day, co-sponsored by Collins, requires search warrants for mail.

“It is my hope that the administration will clarify its intent with this recent statement,” said Collins, a GOP moderate.

The article also reported that “White House spokesman Tony Snow insisted that 'there is nothing new here.' Snow said Bush's signing statement -- which followed a bill signing ceremony during the winter congressional recess that was off-limits to reporters -- merely stated 'present law.' ”

Contrary's to Snow's assertion -- repeated by 9News -- that Bush's latest signing statement is “nothing new,” the Daily News reported that "[a]n assistant attorney general ... wrote in a 2005 letter to Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) that warrantless mail searches 'would be highly unusual.' " The article also quoted Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who said during an April 2005 House Judiciary Committee hearing that even after conducting a warrantless mail search, “you'd have to go to a judge after the fact and explain what you've done.”

As Media Matters for America noted, “Historically, signing statements served a largely innocuous and ceremonial function,” according to Neil Kinkopf, associate professor at Georgia State University College of Law. He explained that, generally, they “are issued by the President to explain his reasons for signing a bill into law. A signing statement thus serves to promote public awareness and discourse in much the same way as a veto message.”

However, as reported in The Boston Globe, Bush has often used signing statements for a different purpose. According to the Globe, “President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office” through the use of signing statements. Rather than vetoing a bill for certain aspects he does not wish to sign into law, Bush has often chosen instead to issue signing statements indicating his intention to disregard provisions in the law. Or, as noted by The Washington Post in a July 24 article, he is asserting his “right to ignore or not enforce laws passed by Congress.”

A July 24 report by the American Bar Association (ABA) noted that Bush has attached more signing statements to congressional legislation than all of the previous 42 U.S. presidents combined:

From the inception of the Republic until 2000, Presidents produced signing statements containing fewer than 600 challenges to the bills they signed. According to the most recent update, in his one-and-a-half terms so far, President George W. Bush (Bush II) has produced more than 800.

The ABA report also stated that “signing statements should not be a substitute for a presidential veto,” and concluded that Bush's use of signing statements “weaken[s] our cherished system of checks and balances and separation of powers.”