Feinstein Continues Pressing Gorsuch on Torture

Feinstein Continues Pressing Gorsuch on Torture

The former head of the Senate intelligence committee leveraged her expertise during confirmation proceedings for the Supreme Court nominee.

Joseph P. Williams, Staff Writer | March 22, 2017

https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2017-03-22/feinstein-continues-pressing-gorsuch-on-torture

Though Democrats have barely put a dent in Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch's aspirations, one particular aspect of his record has cast doubt on his apolitical image: The judge's role in helping the George W. Bush administration justify so-called enhanced interrogation techniques many decry as torture.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the Senate Judiciary Committee's top Democrat, on Wednesday produced emails and a notated memo Gorsuch wrote when he was a Justice Department lawyer under Bush. Included in the documents was one in which Gorsuch affirmed saying that torture produced valuable intelligence.

"The document [asks], 'Has the aggressive interrogation techniques yielded any valuable intelligence? Has it ever stopped a terrorist incident?'" Feinstein said to Gorsuch. "Your handwritten notes say, 'Yes.' What examples did you have?"

"My recollections of 12 years ago was that was the position that the clients were telling us," Gorsuch said, reiterating he was a Bush administration lawyer and not an independent judge.

"You had no personal information? You took the position of your client?" Feinstein asked.

"Yes," Gorsuch answered.

"That circles around in my brain a little bit," replied Feinstein, the former head of the Senate intelligence committee who probed Bush-era "enhanced interrogation techniques" and their results. A report stemming from the committee's work found that the practices were not an effective means of garnering intelligence. "When we looked into it, we really saw the horrendous nature of what went on" in detention centers, including at so-called CIA black sites located in other countries.

"I think terrible things happened. It's a closed chapter and I don't think it should ever happen again," she said.

Gorsuch agreed, but it's likely Senate Democrats will use the judge's related experience in his confirmation vote – particularly as it relates to how he views the power of the man who appointed him, President Donald Trump.