CIA nominee says she wouldn't resume brutal interrogations

President Donald Trump's nominee to lead the CIA has told senators privately that she would stand firm against any effort to restart the brutal detention and interrogation program the spy agency ran after 9/11, administration officials said today.

In comments meant to soften the public profile of Gina Haspel before her confirmation hearing on Wednesday, two administration officials said she was not the "architect" of the programme, but a "line officer" who never interrogated any terrorism suspects.

The officials, who are familiar with her meetings on Capitol Hill, were not authorised to discuss her private conversations with the senators and spoke only on condition of anonymity.

It's unclear if Haspel's pledge will be enough to sway Democrats who say the acting CIA director should be disqualified because she was the chief of base at a covert detention site in Thailand where two terrorism suspects were subjected to waterboarding a technique that simulates drowning.

Haspel's vow to fight any attempt to resurrect the programme puts her in the same camp as Defence Secretary Jim Mattis, who has advised Trump that he doesn't think torture is an effective interrogation tactic. But it's at odds with Trump, who spoke in the campaign about toughening the US approach to fighting extremists and vowed to authorise waterboarding and a "hell of a lot worse."
"Nominees make all kinds of promises when they're trying to get confirmed," Wyden said. "The Senate and the public need to know what kind of person is making those assurances, or else they're just words. That's why Ms. Haspel's background needs to be declassified right now."
"If she did not stand up for the law and basic morality when it mattered, why should any senator believe that she will say no to any illegal order from this president?"