Republicans: Nancy Pelosi could have objected
TAGS: Republicans, John McCain, Nancy Pelosi, Waterboarding, Torture
By GLENN THRUSH | 5/13/09 4:29 AM EDT
Why didn’t Nancy Pelosi do more to stop waterboarding?
With the “what did she know and when did she know it” questions more or less resolved — Pelosi learned that the Bush administration was waterboarding detainees no later than February 2003 — Republicans are now directing their attacks on the muted, indirect way in which she responded.
On Tuesday, GOP leaders openly scoffed at Pelosi’s claim she was prevented from opposing the policy six years ago because the briefings were classified.
“If she felt it was wrong, she should have acted,” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a longtime waterboarding critic, told POLITICO on Tuesday. “Let me just tell you, I was briefed on it — and I vehemently objected to it. We did the Detainee Treatment Act, which prohibited cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.”
McCain, who drew criticism from the left for opposing a Democratic waterboarding ban last year, added, “I’m sure she has her argument, and we’ll see if the American people agree.”
Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly dismissed such criticism as “Republican attempts to create a distraction” from their own culpability on interrogation.
Over the past week, a half-dozen senior Republican and Democratic aides canvassed by POLITICO have outlined a menu of options Pelosi could have pursued to protest harsh interrogations.
All agreed she could have written a classified letter to the CIA — as Rep. Jane Harman, her successor on the intelligence committee, did after she was briefed on the technique in February 2003.
Pelosi, they said, also could have pressured President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney directly by requesting a meeting with them, or by buttonholing them during previously scheduled meetings, or by writing a letter to them.
“To the best of my knowledge, she didn’t do any of those things,” said Rep. Pete Hoeskstra (R-Mich.), currently the ranking member of the House intelligence committee.
“We were in the minority at that point,” replied Daly, who dismissed the idea of protesting directly to the White House. “We were not in a position to change the policy. When the Democrats took over in 2007, we passed a bill outlawing torture — and the president vetoed it, with the support of Sen. McCain.”
Pelosi has angered Republicans by pushing for a “truth commission” into the Bush administration’s possible use of torture, but the news that she learned of waterboarding in 2003 has left her on the defensive.
When asked about Pelosi’s predicament on Tuesday, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) offered no sympathy and seemed to grow angrier as he spoke.
politico.com |
