Attorney General John Ashcroft Testifies to the Senate Judiciary Committee

— -- During a three hour grilling Attorney General John Ashcroft faced a torrent of questions about the Bush Administration's counterterrorism policies, but most of the focus was focused on torture of detainees. Ashcroft, who was making his first appearance before the Judiciary Committee in 15 months, was sharply questioned by Democratic members on the both the Iraq prison abuse scandal and the wider use of torture for Al Qaeda detainees that has been outlined in policy memos by the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel.

An August 2002 memo written by Jay Bybee, leaked hours before Ashcroft's testimony, notes that inflicting moderate pain may not be legally interpreted as torture. The legal opinion was prepared for the CIA to provide guidance on what type of treatment would not be defined as torture. This legal opinion did not go over well with the Democratic committee members, who demanded copies of the memo and accused Ashcroft of possibly being in contempt for not providing them to Congress. The contempt argument seems to have been only made for dramatic effect, though, since the Committee would have to vote to request the memos then issue a subpoena and have it refused before a contempt proceeding could begin.

Ashcroft was adamant in his defense of not revealing internal deliberations or advice provided to the President, telling the committee, "I have stated a reason and that is that. The President has a right to receive advice from his Attorney General in confidence, and so do other executive agencies of government."

Iraq Links and Investigation

After Ashcroft maintained he would not release the memos, Sen. Edward Kennedy pulled out pictures from Abu Ghraib and said, "We know when we have these kinds of orders what happens. We get the stress test. We get the use of dogs. We get the forced nakedness that we've all seen on these. And we get the hooding. This is what directly results when you have that kind of memoranda out there."

Ashcroft reacted by saying, "Let me completely reject the notion that anything that this President has done or the Justice Department has done has directly resulted in the kinds of atrocities which were cited. That is false. It is an inappropriate conclusion."

Ashcroft also confirmed that a special team for prosecuting the cases was established at the U.S. Attorney's office in the Eastern District of Virginia. "It's a US Attorney's office that's accustomed to international items because it is the home of both the CIA and the Pentagon," Ashcroft said.

Ashcroft also said that "There is one case outside that framework that is being prosecuted, and was being prosecuted earlier, before we became aware that we might have a broader responsibility here. But we are investigating items both on referral from the Department of Defense and from the [Central] intelligence agency."

According to one senior Justice Department official, the three CIA referrals include two agents involved in the Iraqi prison abuse incidents and a separate case involving a CIA contractor who worked in Afghanistan. On May 20, the Justice Department received a referral to investigate a civilian Defense Department contractor for his role in the Iraqi prison abuse.

Evasive

Using his lawyerly skills Ashcroft was highly evasive with the Democrats and, especially during heated exchanges, Ashcroft at times came away appearing smug. A good example: SEN. PAT LEAHY: That was not my question. Has there been any order directed from the president with respect to interrogation of detainees, prisoners or combatants, yes or no? ASHCROFT: I'm not in a position to answer that question.LEAHY: Does that mean because you don't know or you don't want to answer? I don't understand.ASHCROFT: The answer to that question is yes.

He topped that in this exchange with Senator Durbin:

DURBIN: The chairman asked you a specific question. Are there memos classified?ASHCROFT: Some of these memos may be classified in some ways for some purposes.I don't know. I don't. DURBIN: Mr. Attorney General, with all due respect, that is a complete evasion. What you have done is refuse to cite a statutory basis for disclosing these memos, refused to claim executive privilege, and now suggest that some parts of these may be classified.

Rules of Torture and GenevaSen. Dianne Feinstein told Ashcroft "These memos actually either reverse or substantially alter 30 years of interpretation by our body, as well as the executive, of the Geneva Conventions."

After repeated questioning Ashcroft indicated that Congress was the one to define torture in various laws and statutes. "Let me just say that it is not the job of the Justice Department or this administration to define torture. Torture has been defined by the Congress," Ashcroft said. "I just want to make clear that I don't view my job as the job of defining torture. The Congress of the United States defined torture, and it defines torture based on the way the Senate of the United States agreed to international conventions relating to torture and to the Geneva Conventions."

Earlier OLC memos which have been previously reported from January 2002 written by John Yoo Noted that al Qaeda was not a traditional enemy and that the Geneva conventions did not apply to the terrorist group. "The President ordered the Department of Defense to treat al Qaeda and Taliban detainees humanely," Ashcroft said, "and, to the extent consistent with military necessity, in a manner consistent with the principles of the Geneva Conventions."

After trying to extract information from Ashcroft, Sen. Biden yelled rather dramatically, "There's a reason why we sign these treaties: to protect my son in the military. That's why we have these treaties. So when Americans are captured, they are not tortured. That's the reason, in case anybody forgets it. That's the reason." Ashcroft responded by saying his son also served in the military.