Mukasey: No Prosecution for Waterboarders

Feb. 7, 2008— -- Attorney General Michael Mukasey told a congressional panel Thursday that CIA interrogators who waterboarded detainees would not be subject to prosecution because they were acting on legal guidance from the Justice Department.

Asked by House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., whether he would start a criminal investigation into the agency's use of the controversial interrogation technique, which simulates drowning, Mukasey answered, "No, I am not, for this reason: Whatever was done as part of a CIA program at the time that it was done was the subject of a Department of Justice opinion through the Office of Legal Counsel and was found to be permissible under the law as it existed then."

Lawmakers broached the subject with Mukasey just days after CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden admitted to Congress that the CIA had used the technique in the past.

"The CIA has not used waterboarding for almost five years. We used it against these three high-value detainees because of the circumstances of the time," Hayden told the Senate Intelligence Committee Tuesday.

"Very critical to those circumstances was the belief that additional catastrophic attacks against the homeland were imminent," Hayden said.

Hayden explained his rationale for that revelation, telling the House Intelligence Committee Thursday that it was a "very difficult decision" to divulge the information, but that the "the question of waterboarding had become so much of the public discourse about the activities of the American intelligence community and that the public debate -- and we exist in a political context and are not immune to this broader political discussion -- is quite appropriate."

Hayden added that it was the agency's "strong belief that the political discussion that was going on was misshaped and misformed."

Hayden reiterated his stance that waterboarding was conducted under legal circumstances, but he did note that the technique is no longer included in the CIA's current program and that agency lawyers are not certain of its lawfulness.