Key Democrat concerned about Trump’s ‘troubling’ CIA director pick
Rep. Mike Pompeo, Donald Trump’s pick to be CIA director, has called for expanding the surveillance powers of U.S. intelligence agencies while strongly defending waterboarding and other “enhanced interrogation tactics.” Those hard-line views are already drawing criticism from a leading Democrat on Capitol Hill, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, who called Pompeo’s selection “deeply troubling.”
“Given its recent history of operating a disastrous torture program and then spying on the Senate itself, the Agency demands principled leadership now more than ever,” Wyden, a veteran member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement Friday. “Unfortunately, Representative Pompeo’s comments in which he asserted that the CIA’s torture program was legal and that the American people did not deserve to know about it are deeply troubling.”
Wyden was referring to Pompeo’s blistering comments two years ago when the Senate Intelligence Committee released a landmark report documenting CIA abuses during the interrogation of terror suspects — including the use of “rectal feeding” and mock executions. Pompeo lashed out at the panel’s then chair, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., for releasing the report, saying she had “put American lives at risk” by disclosing details about what the CIA had done.
“Our men and women who were tasked to keep us safe in the aftermath of 9/11 — our military and our intelligence warriors — are heroes, not pawns in some liberal game being played by the ACLU and Senator Feinstein,” said Pompeo in a statement at the time. “These men and women are not torturers, they are patriots. The programs being used were within the law, within the constitution, and conducted with the full knowledge of Senator Feinstein.”
His defense of waterboarding is far from Pompeo’s only view that could make him anathema to liberals and civil libertarians. A tea party conservative who graduated from West Point and Harvard Law School, Pompeo has been a vigorous foe of the agreement to curb Iran’s nuclear program. He consistently denounced Hillary Clinton’s role in failing to prevent the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya — at one point calling Benghazi “worse than Watergate.”
After Congress enacted a new law last year terminating the NSA’s bulk collection of phone records — a response to the disclosures of former contractor Edward Snowden — Pompeo co-authored a newspaper op-ed citing the terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., as justification for reinstating the program and even expanding U.S. surveillance powers. He also lamented that the collection of communications of terror suspects had been “dumbed down” by the Obama administration with overly “onerous” requirements to obtain warrants.
“The intelligence community feels beleaguered and bereft of political support,” Pompeo wrote. “What’s needed is a fundamental upgrade to America’s surveillance capabilities.”
Wyden stopped short of vowing to oppose, much less filibuster, Pompeo’s nomination. And the soon-to-be nominee got a somewhat warmer reception from Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., the new vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who praised Pompeo for his “firsthand appreciation for Congress’ responsibility to provide vigilant oversight of our nation’s intelligence activities.” Speaking on CNN, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the ranking minority member on the House Intelligence Committee, also applauded Pompeo’s selection. Schiff said that despite their policy differences, his colleague was “well qualified” for the job. “They couldn’t have picked a more capable person for the position,” he said.
Pompeo also got a positive endorsement from an unlikely source Friday: Evan McMullin, the former CIA officer who ran for president against Trump. McMullin, who worked with Pompeo as a top policy aide to the House Republican Conference, praised the Kansas lawmaker as a “strong-willed” personality who despite his hard-line policy views is “open to new information.” Added McMullin: “He’s the right kind of personality to come into the agency and take control of it.”
