reconsider is laid upon the table the unfinished business is the further consideration of the veto message of the president on the bill h r twenty eighty two which the clerk will report by title h r twenty two a natural authorized appropriations for fiscal year two thousand and eight for intelligence and intelligence related activities of the united states government the community management account and the central intelligence agency retirement and disability system and for other purposes the question is will the house on reconsideration pass the bill the objections of the president to the contrary notwithstanding the gentleman from texas mr ray is recognized for one hour thank you mr speaker for purposes of debate only i yield the customary thirty minutes to the distinguished gentleman from michigan mr hoekstra and pending that are you myself such time as i may consume without objection the gentleman is recognized which you could i ask you to have order in the house the house will i rise in support of overriding the president's veto this year for the first time in three years the congress passed an intelligence authorization act and presented it to the president this was something that had proved impossible for a republican controlled house and the republican controlled senate in recent years while the bill of the bill passed the house it never even got to conference when i took over as chairman of the intelligence committee i made passing an authorization all the way through conference a high priority it was an easy he but i thought it was crucial that we revitalize the oversight process and i committed to getting an authorization bill not only passed through the house but sent to the president the intelligence community by its very nature presents a very difficult oversight challenge for congress this is why the intelligence authorization bill is so critical it is the culmination of all the committees oversight activities conducted over the previous year intelligence funding is one of the few areas where the law requires funds to be both appropriated and authorized our constituents of course are demanding that we on all the important intelligence related challenges that our face that our nation is facing this legislation goes a long way toward strengthening oversight of the intelligence community which the president seems to consistently want to fight that's why the president vetoed it he wants the authority to do whatever he wants in secret with no oversight or authorization or without any checks and balances well mr speaker i don't agree the constitution gives us a role in this process we do have a say in the name of the united states of america in what the intelligence community does that's why we need to override this veto this legislation enhanced as oversight in several ways it requires quarterly reports to congress on the nuclear weapons programs of iran and north korea we learned a lesson from the experience in iraq congress must be careful and must be part of the process and a consumer of intelligence to avoid being sold a bill of goods the act requires a cia inspector general to audit covert activities at least once every three years covert activities are historically where our intelligence community runs into legal and policy trouble and independent  cia i g audit is one way to prevent problems that have embarrassed our nation and have eroded our moral authority the authorization act also requires detailed accounting to congress on the use of intelligence contractors the use of contractors has grown exponentially and no one is asking critical management questions about whether this is a good use of taxpayer money and importan provision of the legislation also requires the cia and the rest of the intelligence community to abide by the same regulations that d o d follows in the context of interrogation if it's not permissible for soldiers in iraq where they face a life or death threat daily that shouldn't be permissible for a cia officer or contractor mr speaker if this veto stands all of these important oversight provisions will disappear if we believe in strong oversight we need to override this veto in addition to addressing long ignored oversight issues the legislation is fundamentally the mechanism for authorizing funds for the intelligence community this legislation authorizes funds for the full range of critical intelligence activities it authorizes funds to support counterterrorism operations to keep americans safe today and it authorizes funds for the strategic intelligence investments to keep americans safe in the future mr speaker if we fail to override this veto the intelligence committee will be silent on these important authorization issues once more will have no authorization bill the bill also addresses some persistent management problems in the intelligence community it requires steps towards a multi level security clearance system to recruit more native speakers of critical languages into our intelligence community it takes important steps towards creating a more diverse workforce to strengthen our ability to collect intelligence all over the world mr speaker if we fail to override this veto it's business as usual no new solutions just the same all intelligence problems i have visited the patriotic men and women of the intelligence community in all cities around the globe i have visited the patriotic men and women of the intelligence community in the far corners and the far reaches all over the go globe they deserve our support they are brave they are competent and in most cases the our home will to be doing the job to keep us safe many serve our nation behind the scenes and at great risk without any expectation of recognition or congratulations for them and for all americans this is important legislation the intelligence community came to us for money they came for us to us were tools and they came to us for new authorities we gave them what they asked for the president with his veto is denying him them those very things simply because he wants no limits on his presidential power so today mr speaker i urge my colleagues to vote to override the president's veto and with that i reserve the balance of my time gentleman reserves the balance of his time the gentleman from michigan thank you mr speaker i yield myself as much time as i may consume gemma's recognized mr speaker this it was just the latest example of the complete and utter failure of the democratic leadership in the house to give the intelligence community the tools that it needs to protect the american people and our allies from radical jihadists who have sworn to wage holy war against freedom in order to impose a radical religious tyranny i urge my colleagues to oppose this override of the president's veto my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are finding out how tough it is to pass legislation in the intelligence area but the lesson they need to learn this is about national security and national security issues need to be done on a bipartisan basis and it cannot be done on a purely partisan basis the debate on this authorization bill is not about a single issue a sum of what have you believe it is about the need to ensure that we give the right tools to our intelligence professionals in this time of enhanced the rats what we should be talking about today is improving this bill so that it can have broad bipartisan support but we also ought to be talking about pfizer pfizer modernization that is the vote that this house should be considering that is the tool that our intelligence community has said that they need to keep our keep america safe that is the tool that on a broad bipartisan basis the model for how we should be doing legislation in this area it's how they did it in the senate sixty eight senators on a bipartisan basis saying we need to do pfizer reform we need to do it to keep america sa to keep our homeland safe to keep our troops say to keep our embassies our personnel overseas say and to make sure that we also have the tools in place that so many of our allies rely on to keep them say but now once again this house moves in a partisan basis now it's been almost twenty five days now that the leadership on the other side of the aisle has refused to even up for a vote fison modernization each and every day our capabilities in this area are road one of the most important and one of the most successful tools that we have used to keep america say over the last seven years is slowly eroding my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will not even allow it to come up for a vote the united states continues to employ tough anti terrorist programs because the radical jihadist threat that not and with nine eleven one only has to listen to the statements by bin laden is deputies hari to understand the seriousness of this throughout its global implications of the determination of radical jihadist to strike the american homeland but instead of doing a bipartisan national security issue that we continue to move down the path of partisan politics the majority leadership of this house refuses to see or hear the continuing threat from radical jihadists even more troubling the majority refuses to recognize that top anti terrorist tools employed since two thousand and one have protected this country from terrorist attacks instead some of distorted anti terrorist programs as threats to the american people rather than tools that our intelligence agencies are using to protect us from threats of radical jihadist terrorism instead of helping to strengthen anti terrorist tools my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have established a clear pattern of trying to undermine and erode them undermining  cuyp of people that we should be trying to help with this bill the men and women who risk their lives each and every day in the intelligence community to do what america's say to keep america safe there's no better example than the outright refusal of the majority leadership to allow a straight up or down vote on bipartisan fison modernization legislation again this is a bill that passed the senate overwhelmingly clearly supported by and majority of this house there's ample reason to be concerned about this abus majority's power i'm far more concerned at the impact that these actions are continuing to have and the capabilities of our intelligence professionals to protect our country our people and our allies from attack with that i reserve the balance of my time on the reserves this time the gentleman from texas thank you mr speaker with that i want to bring us back on point by yielding three minutes to my good friend from missouri the chairman of the armed services committee mr skelton gentleman from missouri is recognized for three proliferation counter intelligence analysis and language skills and addition chairman read this conference report includes a provision which requires an all interrogations conducted by intelligence agents and contractors comply with the army field manual on interrogation our military already has raised the standards that since september two thousand and six all interrogations which are conducted by men and women in uniform are conducted by non military personnel on a detainee who is otherwise in the custody of the u s military and must provide and must abide by the army field manual the manual explicitly prohibits eight interrogation techniques including what her boring waterboarding is the technique which originated during the spanish inquisition and makes the person who's being interrogated feel as though he as drowning one of the of our founding fathers ben franklin once told us those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety with that's where we find ourselves on this issue and although very senior civilians within the ministration continue to waffle on whether waterboarding continues can constitute torture or cruel and inhuman or degrading treatment our military has stood up against this while they condemned practice our military understands the impact of the golden rule do unto others as you would have them do and to you our military also appreciates that approved interrogation techniques which are not cruel inhuman or degrading have provided valuable intelligence which has helped capture terrorists kingpins and hoyle terrorist attacks against our country as well as our allies the sooner that we reclaim our moral authority in the world by clearly articulating which techniques we find to be a burra regardless of the nationality of the interrogator the sooner we can better protect our homeland and our folks in uniform who are in harm's way i strongly encourage all my colleagues in this body both sides of the aisle to strengthen our national security by supporting this very back gentlemens time has expired the gentleman from michigan this time i'd like to yield four minutes to a member of the committee mr thornberry john has recognized for four minutes thank you misspeak or i think the gentleman rise in opposition to this bill and in opposition to overriding the president's veto i think it's fine for us to stand up here on the floor and make all the speeches we want to about what the administration has or has not done that we like there are some of those criticisms of the administration that i might well agree with about what they've done in the past but i think it is a far different thing to stand up here and argue that we should put into law a measure that ties the hands of the professionals we expect to keep us safe this bill ties the hands of our national security professionals in a number of ways one way is that it does not date  law which may well be the most important single thing the intelligence community does today that helps keep us safe and in fact as as a gentleman from michigan noted we are nearly thirty days beyond the expiration date of the protect america act and every day that goes by makes us more vulnerable to a terrorist attack a bipartisan compromise in the other body garner sixty eight votes and yet we can't even have the leadership of this house bring it up for a vote to be considered so that each individual member can exercise his judgment and his or her judgment or conscience and how they vote if that measure had been rejected by the house would be one thing but to never allow it to come up means that the leadership of this house insists on tying our hands preventing our national security professionals from having the tools they need to do the job i think that's inexcusable this measure before us also ties the hands of our national security person professionals by limiting the interrogation techniques they can use and even more than that broadcasting to the world the only interrogation techniques which can be used it's like giving al qaida the training manual that they need to prepare their people for and i know that the chairman of voces committee just spoke i wonder if he would be in support of just sending our battle plans out to any potential adversary saying this is what we're planning on doing you'll go ahead and be perfect get ready for it we will tell you in advance what our intentions are that's essentially what this bill does and i note mr speaker and a writer stuart taylor national journal last december put the scenario pretty well he says a magine we get osama bin laden or some high level lieutenant with the intelligence reports that a massive new al qaida attack may be eminent here's the questions all members ought to answer when considering how they're going to vote should it be illegal for cia interrogators to try to scare the person into talk by yelling at them should it be illegal to threaten to slap them and some why should it be illegal to pretend to be an interrogator from a different country should it be illegal to turn up the year conditioning so they are uncomfortably cold should it be illegal to deny them hot food while giving them all the cold food that they want because all of those things would be illegal under the provision that's in this bill it's not about waterboarding it's about having a guarantee of hot food comfortable temperature no sort of deception having no one raised their voice against you those are the protections for the terrorists that are in this bill and i think that's a mistake i think it's a mistake to tell them what we're going to do and i think it's a mistake to take options off the table like turning up the air conditioning that these provisions not having the  modernization limiting their interrogation methods treats our american professionals at the prez the problem and that's the problem with this bill it should be rejected gentleman's time has expired the gentleman from texas  speaker continuing on this path old universe and now yield three minutes the gentlewoman from california miss an issue who chairs one of our subcommittees on intelligence and community management from california recognized for three minutes i thank our very distinguished wonderful a chairman of the house intelligence committee mr speaker we are here this evening for one reason and one reason only it is to override the president's veto of the house authorization for the intelligence community and the reason the stated reason and the president said so the reason he vetoed the bill is because he is for torture he all r t u r a d it's what the president said this is a very sad dark moment for our country that a president of the united states would remove all of the tools that we've provided for the intelligence community in a post nine eleven world and say because you don't allow torture i'm not for the bill now the president's position is entirely inconsistent with our nation's history the united states of america has long excepted that torture is beneath the standards of a civil nation in one nine hundred forty seven the united states prosecuted a japanese military officer for carrying out a form of water torture on a u s civilian the military has frequently prosecuted american military personnel for subjecting prisoners to torture since the spanish american war our nation was able to win two world wars and defeat a rising tide of communism with a torture prohibition in place and i think that we can defeat america's enemies today without lowering ourselves with or without allowing ourselves to become the organizers against us that's what we have done and we have did not only degraded ourselves but helped to chip away at the magnificent credibility of our great nation that people before us provided and now we stand on their shoulders and a president of the united states bill because he stands for torture we should slam that door shut and the way we do it is by overriding this president's veto there isn't any room in our country for this and for anyone to describe these things as being sissies because you stand against torture that is really shameful that's really shameful with all due respect this is a tough position it's the right position so i urge my colleagues to vote to override the president's veto because that veto was about torture gentlewoman's time has expired the gentleman from michigan this morning time i'd like to yield four minutes to my colleague from arizona mr flake gentleman from arizona is recognized for four minutes i thank the gentleman for yielding and let me bring up another aspect another reason we should sustain the president's veto that has been talked about yet when this bill was brought to the floor initially there were some twenty one i think or twenty six earmarks in the legislation first we were told there are no earmarks then we have got a wild goose chase in the intelligence room to find if there were we found out there actually were then we finally got a list belatedly we got the list of earmarks i think about five hours after the deadline for us to submit a list of earmarks that we wanted to challenge how convenient it was that and we were told not just procedural but too late you won't be able to offer any amendments we were told at the beginning of the process this year that every year mark that was offered in a piece of legislation in a conference report and a committee report would be able to be challenged on the house floor that wasn't the case here we had twenty some about eighty million dollars that were never challenged that still to this day cannot have not will not be challenged by this house so that for the process alone we shouldn't go forward with this piece of legislation these weren't just any earmarks one eighty million dollars worth and two there was bit there were bigger march like twenty three million for the national drug intelligence center this is a center that the president has been trying to shut down for years because it doesn't chordate efforts as it should it gets i think about thirty nine million in the underlying bill and another twenty one million in earmarked money in this piece of legislation that's sixty two i'm sorry twenty three million and in taxpayer dollars in this piece of legislation that's sixty two million in taxpayer funding for an entity that the president and the executive branch want to close down but it happens to be in the district of a particular powerful member and so it stays again we weren't able to challenge that that led as we all know to an altercation here on the house floor between a few members a privilege resolution that was offered but still that earmark remains all of these earmark that still haven't been able to be challenged by the house remaining in this piece of legislation mr speaker if there was ever ever a case study and why we need an earmark moratorium it is this piece of legislation that we're dealing with right now no matter what you do the earmarks remain we even had a motion to instruct offered by my colleague from michigan to take the earmarks in this bill out remove them because they haven't been challenged and they weren't brought to the floor in the proper manner that that motion soon struck passed with a vote two hundred forty nine votes in favor of a sufficient number of republicans and a significant number of democrats voted for that motion to instruct to take the earmarks out but here we are with this piece of legislation again today and every one of those earmarks still remains you can't take that out we have to have a moratorium on  and so we can address this process you can have good rules and i commanded the democrats when they put the rules in place in january of this year i'm i mention that i thought that they were fair in fact a little stronger than what we as republicans had put the having said that rules are all the as good as your willingness to enforce them and the rules were not enforced here again this legislation came to the floor with their marks that we were never able to challenge that came before after the deadline when we were to submit the list that to challenge and then the house acted we acted to address and with a clear sufficient majority said let's take the earmarks out but still they remain that all to sustain the president's veto this legislation jones time has expired the gentleman from texas thank you mr speaker and i would tell the gentleman from arizona that this veto is not about earmarks it's about tortured with that i know you'll three minutes the gentleman from the mr holt who serves as the chairman of the select intelligence oversight panel the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for three minutes mr speaker i thank the chairman of the committee when congress passed this bill last year i lauded several of its features provisions aimed at attracting and retaining people with good foreign language capability and understanding of foreign cultures a provision bringing speed to security clearance processes for new hires the provision directing the national director of national intelligence to establish a multi level security clearance process provision requiring the inspector general to review all covert action programs and a number of other things getting these things right is critically important because intelligence is among the most important functions of our government a good intelligence system can save lives by preventing war or should war come by helping to win the war as quickly as possible but a flawed intelligence system can be dangerous as when intelligence is manipulated so as to take america to war under false pretenses or when fearsome powers of the government are turned on its own citizens without checks and balances indeed it's because this president opposes checks and balances on our intelligence system that we're forced to have this veto override today let's be clear american personnel civilian or military should never engage in a tara geisha and practices that amount to torture the provision the president objects to would simply put the entire u s government under one standard for interrogating detainees the army field manual the heads of the defense intelligence agency and the f b i have testified that non torture guidelines in this bill are adequate for their people to follow in interrogation of dangerous people if the president were serious about restoring our reputation in the world and about providing moral and legal clarity for all government employees involved in the handing handling or interrogation of detainees he would never have details this bill providing that moral and legal clarity is our constitutional obligation and to that and i  gentlemen is recognized for two minutes thank you was speaker i am a four for five veto overrides of our president but this is not one of them this bill limits our intelligence professionals at a time when we need more people in the office of the director of national intelligence the bill fails to provide tools to monitor foreign terrorist communications when we should be monitoring more of them and it also provides less resources to our own intelligence community not more the bill also does have earmarks in which the committee delayed publication senators mccain and clinton and obama all now support a complete moratori on earmarks this year but this legislation does not do that we not only hamstring our intelligence community by this bill we waste millions of dollars on zero or low quality earmarks that have little utility to the intelligence community we should bring back this bill without any spy pork mr speaker i still serve in the intelligence community and we all know that torture is illegal and we all read the papers and know that all republican and democratic candidates for president are against waterboarding so in january of this year that will be over but the rest of the issues in this bill will not does this bill hamstring  community it does does it fun twenty six items of spy pork it does and for these reasons should not pass this flawed piece of legislation you'll back gentleman yields back his time the gentleman from texas  illinois is recognized for three minutes thank you and i thank our chairman for yielding me this time and for his great leadership on this issue and for making it clear that this veto was about torture in december i said that restrictions on the use of torture represented a battle for the soul of our country because the president chose to veto this critically important legislation that battle continues today the way we treat our prisoners is a fundamental measure of our character it is what separates great nations with moral authority to lead from other lesser nations the president's national security team has now publicly confirmed that the cia water boarded detainees incredibly president bush and his advisers insist that they have the legal authority to do so again and that they don't consider it torture these claims have damaged our nation's moral authority and credibility around the world there is a simple way to restore some of our moral authority it is in this bill in the form of a provision mandating that all intelligence agencies and those under contract or subcontract with our intelligence agencies comply with the u s army field manual on interrogation guidelines the interrogation rules on the army field manual have served us well but don't just take my word for it generals intelligence professionals diplomats religious leaders and foreign leaders many of our many of them our closest allies have all spoken out against the use of current coercive tech nick such as waterboarding consider the words of navy commander of joint task force guantanamo which is already required to comply with the army field manual who recently stated that quote we get so much dependable information from just sitting down and having a conversation and treating them like human beings in a businesslike manner unquote what about the advice of the republican presidential nominee senator john mccain who before changing his mind and joining with president bush to oppose this bill and with it congress's effort to ban torture stated that the issue of interrogation was quote a quote defining issue unquote and that interrogation should be quote humane and yet effective unquote and that an army general in iraq  him that quote the techniques under the army field manual are working and working effectively and he didn't think they need to do anything else unquote and december congress made its voice known and passed this critically important bill with one flick of his pen the president tried to take our voice away i believe it is time to say once and for all no to techniques like waterboarding no torture and no to this president's attempt to legitimize his administration political legacy at the cost of this nation's moral authority i urge all my colleagues to join with me in but in voting to override the president's veto and i yield back gentlewoman yields back her time the gentleman from michigan yield myself three minutes gentleman is recognized for three minutes thank the chair interesting that this debate is about something that hasn't been done for five years what we need to be talking about is what we haven't been able to do for the last thirty days my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are talking about a technique and a procedure hasn't been used for five years but they're unwilling to talk about the technique that enables us to identify terrorists may have planned for the united states they don't want to address giving the tools to americans who work in the intelligence community that have proven to be effective they're willing to give our playbook to al qaeda but at the same time they've taken away our most effective tool to try to determine exactly what al qaeda may be up to it is probably the most glaring deficiency in this bill but there are there are many others that fails to provide adequate resources for human intelligence the earmarks we've heard about failed constrain the size of the intelligence bureaucracy fails to rationalize how we're going to put the intelligence community together and then interestingly enough it continues the misplaced priorities we are on  with pfizer we're on willing to give that tool to our intelligence community but we feel that it's more than appropriate to tell our intelligence community to go out and conduct a formal assessment of quote national security the national security aspects of global warming our intelligence professionals in the field need to be really wondering what's going on in the house where they've now watches for thirty days of voiding dealing with the top issue that has proven to be so effective in keeping america safe and at the same time we're arguing here and the majority is arguing is that forget about surveilling al qaeda and radical jihad as you know take take your resources and study national security aspects of global out of global warming although there's many other agencies that already work on that so shelve flies that in fact don't even talk about pfizer don't even bring it to the floor don't do any work on don't put any proposals out there have no bipartisan discussions on where we go with pfizer leave that on the shelf let our capabilities a road go out and study global warming what are the priorities of this house how are we going to keep america safe when we on one hand handcuff our intelligence community and on the other hand we're telling them to go out and study the aspects the national security aspects of global warming without i reserve the balance of my time telling reserves of balance this time gentleman from texas thank you mr speaker on this side we believe that our very capable and dedicated men and women of the intelligence community can keep us safe without torture i know you three minutes to the newest member of our intelligence committee jim in california mr shift selma from california is recognized for three minutes i think the gentleman mr speaker the fight against terror is at one level a military struggle but is also at its roots a battle over hearts and minds on sunday we suffered a major setback in that battle when the president of the united states vetoed legislation that would unequivocally state to the world that we do not condone torture in any form in any place under any circumstance instead by appearing to abandon the rule of law by appearing to step away from the geneva conventions by failing to renounce the use of torture in the clearest of terms we are only undermining our standing in the world and a danger in the lives of our very own men and women when the attorney general the night states recently testified before the judiciary committee he could not tell us if and when waterboarding constituted torture he even suggested that a determination whether something constitutes torture depends on who is being subjected to the technique and the desirability of the information that is being sought his testimony was murky it was ambiguous it failed to establish any bright line for our personnel or for the rest of the world he could only say that if it were done to him well then that would be torture instead the bright line standard if there was one to be found in his testimony and the one that he asked us to hold up to the rest of the world was whether or not a harsh interrogation technique is part of a program authorized by an attorney  the obscure office of legal counsel i am deeply concerned about what this says to our own personnel and about what it says to the rest of the world this is indeed no intangible loss for the effects of this failure of moral leadership may tragically be visited on those brave men and women serving in our armed forces whom among us can fail to recall the opening days of the iraq war when american troops had been captured and were paraded in front of the cameras we were disgusted with their treatment and rightfully so if we hesitate equivocate or otherwise fail to ban the use of waterboarding how can we have any confidence that when american troops are captured they will not be subjected to this form of torture how can we make the case that other nations or other enemies must not torture because we don't torture how can we win the battle for hearts and minds if we surrender our most powerful weapon the power of our good example mr debate is about a bill that the president has outlined in his veto statement is deeply flawed deeply flawed in the content of what is in the bill as to where it directs the president to do and the limitations that it places on the executive branch and being able to conduct the war against radical jihadists affectively but it's also clear that the the message clearly outlines the deficiencies of what is not in the bill the an ability an unwillingness of the democratic leadership to bring to the house the senate passed fison modernization bill a bill that reflects the values of the speaker of the house a bill that reflects the values of the current speaker of the house when she was on the intelligence committee in two thousand and one when these discussions were going were underway that talked about what do we need to do to give our intelligence community the tools that they need to keep america safe so that we can better understand the plans the intentions and the capabilities of al qaida and rather radical jihadists that is where the terrorist surveillance program took wrote bipartisan the president the leadership of the house and the senate the leadership of the intelligence committees and all of them united in saying we need to give this tool this terrorist surveillance program to our intelligence community because it will allow us to collect the information the data that we can use to keep america safe and that program was in place for over five years it was in place and it proved to be very successful and now for thirty days almost thirty days we've been unable to use that tool without i reserve the balance of my time german reserves bounce time  speaker with that i know you two minutes the gentleman from austin texas who was just asking me if as i travel around the world have any of our fine men and women in the intelligence community ever asked to give the tool of torture and i said no with that i get you two minutes to mr dog and i don't think that i will recognize for two minutes with this veto president bush has once again failed to safeguard our families and what is this  waterboarding that the president so readily embraces it sounds a little aka cousin of skateboarding or snowboarding but in fact it is a new name for an old water torture in which a human being is drowned the drowning is controlled to force a response but waterboarding is simply a euphemism for torture by drowning not president bush is not the first texan to think of this and to believe that horrific wrongs can justify drowning in the culprit and our earlier texas water border is not in the white house he was sent to the big house a texas judge said that this waterboarding texas sheriff put law enforcement quote in the hands of a bunch of thugs that would embarrass a dictator the judge said the sheriff was sentenced to ten years for water boy already the judge was right and this administration is so very wrong america seems to have been sentenced to eight years of dick cheney who claims that such water torture is quote a no brainer no brainer that sounds a little like the way you could describe many of the administration's policies at home and abroad torture is no proper tool in the arsenal of democracy torture is foreign to our values it's foreign to our history it's foreign to our religions it's foreign to our laws and it is foreign to our international commit much there can be no compromise on this no battleground we must have zero tolerance for  have abandoned our american values we lose who we are as americans we lose our identity we lose our pride is the greatest nation in this world and if the administration and all of its apologist over here continue forcing the use of torture which president bush's veto indoor says is not only un american it is ineffective that's one reason why the army field manual prohibits even when our military is in harm's way the participating in torture and it is why general david to betray us our commander in iraq wrote to his troops in the field last year the cloak beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal history shows that they are also are frequently neither useful nor necessary i say follow our generals like general pretorius not the cheney ideologues not the apologists override this veto  plod my colleagues are speaking with such passion i wish they had the same passion for addressing the tools that the leadership in the intelligence community have said that they have needed that our intelligence professionals who are in the field have said that they have needed to keep america safe and this leadership has been unwilling to bring it up for almost thirty days the tool that they want the tool that they need and the tool that has proven to be so effective as the terrorist surveillance program which is an updated version of the pfizer legislation it takes the pfizer legislation it moves it forward and it updates it but for almost thirty days that tool has been eroding putting our troops at risk putting our homeland at greater risk putting other u s personnel who are overseas at greater risk and putting our allies who depend so often on the work of our intelligence community putting them at greater risk as al in iraq has said they want to attack jerusalem as has the law has said that they intend to retaliate for the death of move nigh on three or four weeks ago as the radicals seek to destabilize the regimes in the middle east of moderate islamic countries people that are working with us in the war and the threat against radical jihadists our answer to them is we're going to occur tale our intelligence activities and as a result you will be at greater risk because we are going to be of less assistance we're not going to be able to give you the intelligence that you've been receiving for the last five years because our techniques are limited with that i reserve the balance of my time gentlemen there's a balance of this time gentlemen texas thank you mr speaker now yield two minutes to the chairwoman of the homeland security subcommittee on intelligence information sharing and terrorism risk assessment the generally different california misformed generated in california is recognized for two minutes i think the gentleman for yielding for the last several years congress has been unable to pass an intelligence authorization bill this means that the intelligence committee entrusted with major responsibilities a committee on which i was proud to serve for eight years four of those as ranking member has been prevented from setting the direction for our intelligence community finally this year mr speaker the house and senate agreed on a responsible bill and included in that responsible bill language to and the so called cia loophole  vetoed that bill and continues to insist irresponsibly in my view that congress shall not impose a legal framework around interrogation policy i strongly disagree and rock and rise to override his veto interrogations are a crucial tool in the effort to prevent and disrupt attacks against america but congress should not abdicate our obligation to legislate aside from stating the case the bush administration has never offered proof that extreme interrogation techniques like waterboarding are effective i believe senator john mccain who says that waterboarding is torture that such techniques do not work article one section eight of our constitution requires congress to quote regulate captures on land and on water this is our responsibility we have seen the erosion of respect for america comes from scandals like abu grab and incarceration without and at guantanamo bay the military and the f b i conduct interrogation under clear rules so why can't the cia mr speaker my message to the white house is this congress is a co equal branch of government the constitution plainly gives us the power to legislate interrogation policy and we must use it responsibly prohibits cruel inhumane and degrading treatment the standard found in the convention against torture applies to anyone held by by u s authorities we've dealt with that issue we dealt with it in two thousand and five but my colleagues don't want to talk about as they don't want to talk about the other weaknesses in this bill and as clear by what their actions have been for the last four weeks they don't want to talk about pfizer as my former ranking member has indicated it is tough to pass an authorization bill it is tough to pass legislation she and i work together and pass with our colleagues in the senate and intelligence reform act which in many ways has worked in some ways we need to go back and take a look at but one of the things that we learned through that process is to make it work you need to do it in a bipartisan basis the problem with this bill is that it is a partisan bill it passed the senate with a very narrow majority it passed the house on a partisan vote that's not how you're going to get it done you're going to do it the same way the senate has done the pfizer bill but the interesting thing is the model for getting something done which is a bipartisan bill which is what we did on intelligence reform we had republicans and democrats who came together to make it a majority we also had republicans and democrats who opposed us and it was sometimes very painful now when the senate has gone through that process and pass bipartisan bill on pfizer the model twenty seven democrats forty one republicans coming together and modernizing pfizer the end result is this leadership on the house side refuses to deal with it it's on every intelligence issue that we've dealt with in this congress when it comes to national security when it comes to intelligence there's not a balance of compromise it's all about getting everything and that's why the president veto this bill because it is not a bipartisan bill there are many weaknesses in it the focus is on their side all is torture talk about five times with real difference to our men and women in the intelligence community today with that i  reserves balance of this time gentleman texas mr speaker could i think where is the time when both sides and who has the right to close down the texas has five minutes the gentleman from michigan has six and a half minutes then i will reserve my time have the gentleman from michigan catch up with the gentleman from michigan thanks i will yield myself a man and a half gemma from michigan is recognized for a minute i have thank the thank the speaker you know it's interesting as we go through this process and we talk about what's in the bill the provision that we're talking about or that the at least the other side is talking about is a provision that was dropped in in conference that came from the senate that didn't come from the house we ought to follow that model follow that the leadership  e it so interesting we follow the leadership here when it's a partisan vote coming from the senate but when it's a bipartisan effort from the senate leadership on the democratic side will not respond and will not follow this bill we're going to sustain the veto it's a flawed bill through and through it would be interesting for this house to do the right thing to have a vote on a national security issue the modernization of spices to bring that vote i have to i'm very much afraid that we're going to go home thursday or friday of this week we're going to go on a two week recess and once again we will not have dealt with a modernization of pfizer that means that we will go through a period of six seven eight weeks of eroding capabilities each and every day becoming more vulnerable to radical jihadist and other groups who want to harm america with that i reserve the balance of my time the manager's jemma texas thank you mr speaker in my seat a gentleman from michigan it won't be interesting that this lead to a sustained it will be a sad day for this country because it will be sustaining torture with that i know you will two minutes to the gentleman from new york to tell you a member of the judiciary committee mr nadler gentleman from new york i thank the gentleman for yielding mr speaker a few weeks ago i joined my colleagues in writing to the president urging him to sign this conference report this conference report contains a provision that mirrors legislation which i authored with congressman delahunt the american anti torture act that would ensure a single uniform baseline standard for all interrogations conducted by the u s intelligence community i have by the leadership of senator feinstein and the other conferees for including this measure in the report since news of the mistreatment and possible torture of detainees in u been a leader in the effort to establish an enforced the laws of war and the conventions against torture the army field manual so that standing example of our modern military effectively gathers intelligence and observes international norms of conduct we all understand the critical role that intelligence plays in helping petraeus who wrote an open letter the standards the army field manual work effectively and humanely and eliciting information from detainees the ten in general kimmons the deputy chief of staff for intelligence similarly stated no good intelligence is going to come from abusive practices any piece of intelligence which is which is obtained under duress under through the use of abusive techniques would be of questionable credibility mr speaker the president this administration have repeatedly said that america does not torture but most intelligent people know the word of this administration cannot be trusted and to prove the point when asked to place those assurances into law the president refuses now congress must act to override the president's veto and hold him to his word and later this week we will deal with pfizer and all the nonsense spewed by the other side will be dealt with because we will again as we did less and less november test a bill that will give everything to all the administration says they need to them though a place that under dudish will and congressional supervision to protect our liberties as well as our safety i urge support done for five years it's interesting to talk about we're going to get rid of cruel inhumane and degrading treatment we did that in the detainee treatment act of two thousand and five it is prohibited prohibited on any person that is held in u s custody so it's easy to talk about those things it's time that the house start doing the hard the hard stuff and the heavy lifting that heavy lifting is now been put off for almost four weeks and my fear is that we will leave without having resolve the issue between the house and the senate and we will go away for two more weeks because the house in the democratic leadership refuses to do the heavy lifting and refuses to do the hard stuff they're willing to go back and do the stuff that was done in two thousand and five and address issues that haven't occurred for over five years but when it comes to keeping america say and doing what is necessary in giving our tools or giving the tools to the intelligence community to keep us safe the leadership of this house is on willing to as unwilling to act as unwilling to do what is necessary with that reserve the balance of my time gentleman reserves down the texas thank you mr speaker i now feel one minute to the distinguished gentleman from maryland a member of the leadership of this house the majority leader and one that is proud to stand up against torture and for the american people mr hoyer the gentleman from maryland recognized for one minute thank my friend for yielding in response to the distinguished ranking member of the committee let me read a statement from the  march eighth twenty await the president's my disagreement over section three twenty seven is not over any particular interrogate geishas technique for instance is not over waterboarding which is not part of the current cia program he doesn't say that it will not be a part of the cia program he's very carefully worded it is not part of the current program that is why i tell my friend this legislation is relevant that is why in my opinion his presidential candidate although he seems to have changed his mind passed his own bill which the president of course signed and then had a signing statement that he wasn't sure that he had to follow and that torture was not the policy of the united states of america i agree with that it's not should not be but we need to make a very clear statement that it is not wind because the rest of the world is looking at us and wondering what are the values that this great nation we respect so much by as mr speaker on saturday the president could have made a clear unequivocal statement that this great nation does not and will not torture those in our custody be clear this veto was unfortunate and misguided it threatens to further degrade america's moral standing as others have said including colin powell the former secretary of state in this it ministration it threatens to undermine our credibility in the international community and to expose our own military and intelligence personnel to the very same tactics and treatment mr speaker every member here believes that our nation must take decisive action detect disrupt and yes a lemonade terrorists who have no compunction about planning and participating in the mass killings of innocent men women and children in an effort to advance their twisted demented aims we can we will and we must prevail in the war on terror however in the pursuit of those who seek to harm us we must not sacrifice the very ideals that distinguishes us from those who preach death and destruction and say that their ends justify whatever means they may use during the current administration we seen the line blurred between legitimate sanction interrogation tactics and torture and there is no doubt our international reputation has suffered and been staying as a result the excesses of abu ghraib and guantanamo are well known as  the administration's belief that the g geneva convention against torture is and i quote quaint let me repeat that from my colleagues the administration's advice that we got from counsel was that the geneva conventions against torture is quote quite close quote i would suggest to you is as relevant today as it was  these incidents and others sell they are great nation's good reputation and allow our enemies to foment fear and stoke hatred requiring all intelligence agencies to comply with the army field manual on terror geishas is an attempt by this congress pas majorities in both houses to repair the damages the damage that has already been done furthermore the techniques permitted by the army field manual have been been endorsed by a wide array of civilian and military officials as both affect and consistent with our values here in fact is what general david petraeus wrote a memo of the armed forces in iraq last may i believe it has been quoted but it bears repeating quote this is general petraeus some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedient methods to obtain information from the enemy they would the wrong beyond the basic that such actions are a legal history shows that they are also frequently neither useful nor necessary general preparatory us went on to say quote our experience in applying interrogation standards laid out in the army field defeat terrorists we must however we must never let it be said that when this generation of americans was forced to confront evil that we succumb to the tactics of the tyrant i urge my colleagues on both sides of the treatment act outlaws cruel inhumane and degrading treatment there seems to be a sense of urgency to do what we've done and do it again it's too bad that there's no sense of urgency to give  individuals the intelligence community the tools that they need to keep us safe the senate has passed fison we should do the same thing and we should do it before we go home we need to start doing national security issues in a bipartisan basis the longer we continue going down this path of making national security and intelligence issues purely partisan some i call them purely political issues we risk the security and the safety of the american people with that i reserve the balance of my time california is recognized for one minute thank you very much mr speaker i thank the distinguished chairman of the intelligence committee for his leadership on protecting the american people and addition to being chair of the intelligence committee has served for many years on the armed services committee he brings to his position on intelligence the commitment that we all have to protecting the american people to building a strong military second to none to do that to protect the american people he knows that force protection is one of the main priorities of intelligence to protect our forces and when they are in harm's way to make sure they have the intelligence to prevail director direction congress has made strengthening national security and improving america's intelligence capabilities a top priority it is our major responsibility to protect the american people are very first piece of legislation h r one took the bipartisan nine eleven commission recommendations off the shelf as they had been in republican congress and put them into law to better protect the american people we  began our efforts to strengthen america's military the readiness of which has been greatly depleted by the president's failed iraq policy to three store our military strength we have expanded the size of the army and marine corps pass legislation insisting that only fully mission capable forces be read be deployed funded essential equipment including armored humvees the speaker america's security depends on the strength of our military as we all know but also the quality of information gathered and analysis provided by the sixteen intelligence agencies that make up our nation's intelligence community as someone who has served on the house intelligence committee now as a member and an for sixteen years longer than anyone in the congress i understand that policymakers in congress and in the executive branch executive branch must be able to rely on accurate timely and actionable intelligence that is why this intelligence authorization bill invest in human intelligence counterterrorism operations and analysis it is a critical state 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 marshals prohibition on torture to intelligence community personnel the prohibition on torture that the president veto 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 her holding in interrogating captives are consistent with the geneva conventions when we do not torture in the words of retired  all have our views here about intelligence gathering and 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 cooter a former navy judge advocate general he says there is no disconnect between human rights and national security they are 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 chairman thirty retired generals and admirals including general joseph hoar they are former head of the u s central command the central command is the command that oversees our military activities in the iraq region the middle east in the greater middle east area those thirty retired generals and admirals looking again to the voices of those who have led in the military quote 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 acceptable 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 i want to reinforce the message of my colleague and then majority leader standing hoyer in quoting the words of general davis david stated but i think it bears repeating the words of general david petraeus some may argue that we would be more effective if we sanctioned torture or other expedia methods to obtain information from the enemy that would be wrong general petraeus said he went on beyond the basic fact that such actions are illegal history shows that they are frequently neither useful nor necessary these leading military men and women and those of us who support this let's support this legislation to ban on torture believe that we can and we must protect america while preserving our country's deeply held principles 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 madam speaker i am astounded that you can use the word torture and waterboarding as though you were not on the committee of jurisdiction knowing about it as an ex official at the time that it is to have occurred i'm shocked that this is going to be all about a procedure or procedures that in fact the speaker of the house had the ability to know about and condoned for years i'm shocked that the speaker of the house would speak about david petra when in fact david petraeus has said publicly and privately you know on the bit bad field of iraq i can kill the enemy but i can't listen to him if he calls america this today should be about what we haven't done we haven't taken up the senate speiser bill we haven't dealt with the fact that we're in danger every day and that is a member of the intelligence community i know just how damaging the absence of action has been this bill has become a partisan bill and wrongly so i call on my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to fix it and move on rather than complaining about something the speaker is well aware of and with that i yield back the gentleman from texas mr speaker could i inquire the time the gentleman from texas has one minute and the gentleman from michigan has one and a half minutes thank you and the vice the gentleman from michigan i have one additional speaker and then i'm going to be closing with that i know you'll forty five seconds to the gentleman from virginia mr moran general from virginia is recognized forty five seconds mr speaker there are five compelling reasons why we should override the president's ban on the override the president's the bill that would sustain the congressional ban on torture first of all it creates a double standard between the military and our telegenic personnel the rest of the world won't recognize the difference and neither should wait secondly it gives us faulty information somebody being tortured would tell you whatever is necessary in order to stop the torture thirdly it jeopardizes our own personnel because they have a may well consider it a license to torture american presidents fourth it's illegal according to the geneva convention and fifty it is immoral and thus it is un american our founding fathers believe that this nation would be united by a common set of values that we would stand as a model guidepost to the rest of the world this undermines that moral high ground and that's why this bill bonnie telling our intelligence folks that it's time to focus your resources and your skills on studying the national security implications of global warming there are many problems with this bill but the sense of urgency that we have in the intelligence community today is as my colleague pointed from california pointed out today we're going to tell al qaeda exactly what may happen we're going to give them our playbook and at the same time we have stopped and limited our ability to listen to radical jihadists it's now twenty six twenty seven twenty eight days since pfizer or the protect america act has expired how many more days will my colleagues on the other side of the aisle wait before they take up this legislation from the senate will it be one more day it be three more days will it be two more weeks will it be two more months how much greater do you want to increase the risk to the homeland to our allies to our troops before us act the speaker of the house shortly after nine eleven agreed that we needed to act it's beyond me why she doesn't want to act now and speaker this is a critical bill for the intelligence community if you vote to sustain this well you're voting for torture with the president i believe we should stand with the men and women of the community and override the president's veto and with that mr speaker i proud to move the previous question without objection the previous question is ordered the question is will the house on reconsideration pass a bill the objections of the president to the contrary notwithstand reconsideration and it will be followed by a five minute vote on suspending the rules in adopting house resolution one forty eight and house resolution four ninety three this is a fifteen minute