Congress told the CIA what to do back in 2002, New York Republican Rep. Peter King said Sunday, and he finds it "totally hypocritical" that people in positions of power are now "turning on them" with the damaging report on
CIA interrogation procedures that was released this past week.
"They did it, and now they're being attacked for it," King told CNN "State of the Union" host Candy Crowley.
King pointed to an op-ed piece written by former Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska for
USA Today, in which he called the report a partisan document that fails the interests and safety of the United States.
"I give him tremendous credit for this," said King. "Kerrey also thought this was a very partisan report basically written by a very partisan staff, and I want to point that out."
King said that no matter how damaging the report, nothing the CIA had done compares in any way to the treatment dealt at the hands of Al Qaida or the Islamic State (ISIS).
"First of all, what ISIS does is behead people," said King. "They carry out the most brutal type of attacks, rapes, sex slaves, all of that, and for anyone to be comparing what the CIA did to what ISIS does, what Al Qaida does is just wrong."
The report did cause "tremendous damage" to the country's reputation, said King, "but this is a self-inflicted wound with a very partisan, selective report which I think does a terrible injustice to the men and women of the CIA."
Meanwhile, it would help repair the United States' reputation, said King, if President Barack Obama, or the leaders of the House and Senate came forward and "gave the CIA credit for what they did."
But it's difficult to overcome the damage Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., did with the report, said King, and it would be "helpful to speak out and say the CIA did an excellent job and the CIA operated under the most extenuating circumstances. They're responsible for stopping attacks against the United States and we have to stop the self-loathing."
Further, King questioned why the CIA report would have been released at all.
King had particular concern for the sense of trust the men and women of the CIA might have, given the way this report has unfolded. Will the the orders they obey today be questioned under a different administration or political wave tomorrow?
"For instance President Obama, I support his drone policy. Suppose five or ten years from now a Senate report comes out and says that he's guilty of human rights violations, guilty of war crimes because of the innocent people killed by drone attacks, what happens to us then?"
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