Thinkprogress:
In a congressional hearing today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-MI) asked Attorney General Mike Mukasey whether he plans to “investigate whether U.S. interrogators broke the law when waterboarding al-Qaida detainees the years after 9/11.” Mukasey declined:
“Are you ready to start a criminal investigation into whether this confirmed use of waterboarding by U.S. agents was illegal?” asked committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich.
“No, I am not,” Mukasey answered bluntly.
“Whatever was done as part of a CIA program when it was done, was the subject of a Department of Justice opinion, through Office of Legal Counsel, that was found to be permissible under the law as it existed then,” Mukasey said.
On a side note from TPM: Now you know why Jack Goldsmith, the former chief of the DoJ's Office of Legal Counsel, said that OLC has the power to issue “free get-out-of jail cards,” or "advance pardons" with its opinions.
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