Speeches
Pelosi: ‘We Can Begin to Reassert Our Moral Authority by Overriding the President’s Veto’
03/11/2008
Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke on the House
floor this evening to support overriding the President’s veto of the
Intelligence Authorization Act of 2008, which extends the prohibition on the
use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques that currently
applies to the military to the entire Intelligence Community. A majority of the House voted for the
override, 225 to 188, but it failed because it fell short of the necessary
two-thirds majority. Below are the
Speaker’s remarks:
“Mr. Speaker, the New Direction Congress made strengthening
national security and improving
“Our very first piece of legislation—HR 1—took the
bipartisan 9/11 Commission recommendations off the shelf, as they had been in
the Republican Congress, and put them into law to better protect the American
people.
“We then began our efforts to strengthen
“
“As someone who has served on the House Intelligence
Committee now as a member and ex-officio for 16 years, longer than anyone in
the Congress, I understand that policymakers in Congress and in the Executive
Branch must be able to rely on accurate, timely, and actionable intelligence.
“That is why this intelligence authorization bill invests in
human intelligence, counterterrorism operations, and analysis. It is a critical step in protecting our nation,
and the President should have signed it into law.
“Regrettably, President Bush vetoed these critical
investments in our intelligence capabilities because this legislation extended
the Army Field Manual’s prohibition on torture to Intelligence Community
personnel.
“The prohibition on torture that the President vetoed
protected our values, protected American military and diplomatic personnel, and
protected Americans by ensuring accurate intelligence.
“Our nation is on a stronger ground ethically and morally
when our practices for holding and interrogating captives are consistent with
the Geneva Conventions—when we do not torture.
“We all have our views here about intelligence gathering,
analysis, and dissemination. And again,
much of the focus is on force protection, so I look to the words of those who
have served in the military for their view on this subject.
“In the words of retired Rear Admiral Donald Guter, a former
Navy Judge Advocate General: ‘There is no disconnect between human rights and
national security…they’re synergistic. One doesn’t work without the other for
very long.’
“Failing to legally prohibit the use of waterboarding and
other harsh torture techniques also risks the safety of our soldiers and other
Americans serving overseas.
“In a letter to the Congressional intelligence committee
chairmen, 30 retired generals and admirals—including General Joseph Hoar, the
former head of U.S. Central Command—stated: ‘We believe it is vital to the
safety of our men and women in uniform that the United States not sanction the use
of interrogation methods it would find unacceptable if inflicted by the enemy
against captured Americans…’
“Many military officials and intelligence professionals have
also stated that torture is ineffective: it is unlikely to produce the kind of
timely and reliable information needed to disrupt terrorist plots. In the words of General David Petraeus: ‘Some
may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other
expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy. That would be wrong.
Beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal, history shows that they
also are frequently neither useful nor necessary.’
“These leading military men and women, and those of us who
supported this legislation’s ban on torture, believe that we can and we must
protect
“In the final analysis, our ability to lead the world will depend not only on our military might, but also on our moral authority. Today, we can begin to reassert that moral authority by overriding the President’s veto.”