Senate Committee Votes to Declassify Parts of CIA Torture Report—Pending CIA Review of Report

This afternoon the Senate Intelligence
Committee voted 11–3 to order the declassification of about 12
percent of its review of Iraq war–era CIA waterboarding and
interrogation techniques. The declassification order covers 500
pages out of a 6,300-page study—essentially the findings and the
executive summary. The Associated Press
reports:

The intelligence committee and the CIA are embroiled in a bitter
dispute related to the three-year study. Senators accuse the agency
of spying on their investigation and deleting files. The CIA says
Senate staffers illegally accessed information. The Justice
Department is reviewing competing criminal referrals.

“The purpose of this review was to uncover the facts behind the
secret program and the results, I think, were shocking,” said Sen.
Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the committee chairwoman. “The report
exposes brutality that stands in sharp contrast to our values as a
nation. It chronicles a stain on our history that must never be
allowed to happen again. This is not what Americans do.”

We’ve
noted the contrast between Feinstein’s outrage about
surveillance of Senate staff and her defense of the National
Security Agency’s surveillance of other Americans.

The White House says President Barack Obama supports
declassifying the information. Now the CIA, accused of meddling in
the creation of the report, gets to evaluate the report to
determine if any of the contents could compromise national
security. So that should go smoothly, right?