Sen. Mark Kirk on Wednesday condemned the Democratic staffers on the Senate Intelligence Committee as “little zombies” reaching up from their “political graves” and said the panel’s report on the CIA’s harsh interrogations of terror suspects threatened U.S. troops and other personnel overseas.
He took aim squarely at the staffers of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who chairs the intelligence panel. “We may lose a couple of Americans in uniform on the front line in Afghanistan because of this incredible selfish act by Feinstein’s staff,” Kirk said.
Feinstein had a swift rebuke for Kirk. “This is character assassination and as far from the truth as can be,” spokesman Tom Mentzer quoted her as saying in response to Kirk’s comments.
Kirk maintained the Democratic staffers would lose their jobs when Republicans take control of the Senate and committees, including the intelligence panel, Jan. 6. The majority party typically has more staffers on Senate committees than the minority party does.
The Democratic staffers “pushed this because they’re about to lose their jobs, ’cause the American people picked a Republican majority in the last election,” Kirk said. “They wanted so desperately to be relevant and they reached up from the political grave, like (Secretary of State John) Kerry, to do this harm to our troops overseas.”
Kirk spoke to radio talk-show hosts John Kass and Mary Ann Ahern on WLS-AM radio.
Reaction by Republican senators to the lengthy report on the use of enhanced interrogation techniques — which Democrats say amounted to torture — has been mixed.
The report, released Tuesday, takes issue with claims that such techniques led to breakthroughs in the hunt for Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks.
Kirk disagreed with the report, citing the view of Michael Hayden, the former director of the National Security Agency and the CIA.
“Michael Hayden, who was running the CIA, feels that it was one of the most valuable sources of intel that we had on al-Qaida,” Kirk said. “He said there were thousands of reports that came from this, these interrogations, and we should not have cut off that source of intel for us.”
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., on Tuesday issued a statement supporting the report’s release and criticizing the CIA and its “brutal” interrogation techniques as “ineffective.”
“In a democracy, where the people govern, this kind of honest report must not be concealed.
“The interrogation practices detailed in this report are troubling. That our own intelligence agencies refused to disclose the truth even to the highest levels of government is equally disturbing. The report makes it clear that the CIA misled and impeded critical oversight by Congress and even the president of the United States.
“Moreover, these often brutal interrogation techniques were ineffective and counterproductive. A program claiming to make Americans safer did the opposite, placing more American lives in danger and rallying our enemies.”
In his comments, Kirk also referenced Judy Baar Topinka, the Illinois state comptroller known for blunt talk, who died early Wednesday.
“As Judy Baar Topinka would say, thankfully a U.S. special operator put a bullet through bin Laden’s head, ending his horrible career,” he said.
Kirk, a former intelligence officer in the Navy Reserve, is up for re-election in 2016.
Twitter @KatherineSkiba
