Gina Haspel, President Trump’s controversial nominee to become the next Director of the CIA, stumbled badly when asked about the morality of torture. Two Democratic Senators asked her whether or not she believed waterboarding and torturing prisoners was moral.
Haspel, who oversaw the waterboarding programs as head of a secret CIA prison in Thailand after 9/11, responded repeatedly with answers focusing on the legality of the acts – which many have noted were not legal. She appeared to disagree.
Waterboarding is considered torture and thus illegal under U.S. and international law.
When Democratic U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich of New Mexico asked Haspel about the moral aspects of torture, she appeared confused.
“We should hold ourselves to a stricter moral standards, and I would never allow CIA to be involved in coercive interrogations,” she replied when pressed.
“Where was that moral compass at the time?” Heinrich asked, referring to the torture she oversaw after 9/11.
“I know you believe it was legal,” Heinrich responded. “I want to see, I want to feel, I want to trust you have the moral compass that you said you have. You’re giving very legalistic answers to very fundamentally moral questions.”
Haspel, 61, concluded by deferring to her performance evaluations and ended by saying, “My parents raised me right. I know the difference between right and wrong.”
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