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Mr. REED. Mr. President, I would like to discuss my decision to vote against the President's nomination of Gina Haspel to be the next Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, CIA.

First, let me state that I have immense respect for the men and women of the CIA. I have had the opportunity to meet many of them and to personally offer my thanks in some of the world's most dangerous locations. Their work is difficult and demanding but critical to helping safeguard our nation.

I do not question Ms. Haspel's patriotism, intellect, or dedication to the CIA. She has ably served the agency and several Administrations, both Democratic and Republican. Ms. Haspel is clearly a committed professional.

I welcome Ms. Haspel's statement of support for the ``stricter moral standard'' legislatively imposed by Congress with respect to interrogation policies and her admission that, in hindsight, the use of coercive interrogation techniques was a mistake. However, I remain troubled that Ms. Haspel failed to clearly articulate a view that the use of coercive interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, was immoral.

As discussed in a 2008 report by the Senate Armed Services Committee, the CIA's so-called enhanced interrogation techniques were based on Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape, or SERE, techniques used to train members of our military to resist torture. There are those who defend the use of such techniques by the CIA because similar techniques were previously used on our own troops during training activities. However, this argument ignores the fact that coercive interrogation techniques were never intended to be used by U.S. interrogators to gain actionable intelligence. Rather, the SERE techniques, which are based on Communist Chinese interrogation methods used during the Korean War to elicit false confessions, were developed to expose U.S. soldiers to the abusive treatment they might be subjected to if captured by our enemies.

There is simply no comparison between the use of such SERE techniques in a controlled environment to train U.S. military personnel to resist torture by an immoral enemy and their use by the CIA to interrogate detainees after 9/11. There is also no basis for any assertion that they are an effective means to gather intelligence, given their original purpose.

Some have suggested that Ms. Haspel is being held to a higher standard than that of former Director Brennan, who similarly served in leadership positions at the CIA at the same time as the creation and operation of the detention and interrogation program. During his confirmation process, former Director Brennan stated that he was aware of the program during his time at the CIA, but ``did not play a role in its creation, execution, or oversight.'' He also testified, under oath, that he raised significant concerns and ``personal objections'' to colleagues at the time and stated that waterboarding is ``reprehensible'' and inconsistent with American values.

Unfortunately, the same can't be said for Ms. Haspel. There is a lot the public doesn't know about Ms. Haspel due to the CIA's selective declassification of her record, but we do know that she joined the CIA's Counterterrorism Center soon after 9/11 and held various leadership positions in the Directorate of Operations that oversaw the detention and interrogation program. We also know that Ms. Haspel continues to be unwilling to make statements similar to those of former Director Brennan condemning the use of torture.

Lastly, we know that Ms. Haspel supported the destruction of evidence, namely 92 videotapes documenting waterboarding and other coercive interrogation techniques by CIA officers and contractors, despite known objections from superiors at the CIA and the White House. That alone should cause serious, bipartisan concern. Ms. Haspel's claim that she was just following orders is deeply flawed. It may be true that there was no legal prohibition on the destruction of the interrogation tapes, but that does not mean it was moral and ethical, particularly in light of known objections from various senior stakeholders.

At the hearing, I asked Ms. Haspel if she believed the destruction of the tapes was insubordinate, and she declined to describe it as such. Her refusal to clearly acknowledge and repudiate that error, even in retrospect, sets a troubling precedent that could be cited by other CIA officials to justify their own questionable behavior in the future, including those under her supervision.

Never has it been so important to have a Director of the CIA that is willing and capable of speaking truth to power. Ms. Haspel was nominated to lead the CIA by a President prone to misinformation and who, repeatedly, has advocated for the use of U.S. power and capabilities in ways that are inconsistent with U.S. values, including killing the families of terrorists.

I am glad that Ms. Haspel has committed not to restart a detention and interrogation program under her leadership, but I retain serious doubts that she would stand up to President Trump if he directed her to carry out another legal, but morally questionable activity in the future. Taken together, Ms. Haspel's lack of transparency, unwillingness to repudiate torture, and inability to learn from past mistakes do not give me confidence that she is the right person to lead the CIA. I, therefore, voted no on her nomination.

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