President Trump’s CIA nominee Gina Haspel is “100 percent” committed to enduring what is likely to be a grueling confirmation process, a senior White House official said Monday amid reports that she offered to withdraw her nomination.
White House legislative affairs director Marc Short met with Haspel last Friday to discuss the spy agency’s worries about her appearance this week before the Senate Intelligence Committee, during which she’s expected to be grilled on her involvement in the CIA’s enhanced interrogation program following Sept. 11.
“She was 100 percent committed to being the best nominee we could find,” Short told MSNBC on Monday, adding that there’s “a lot riding on” her confirmation hearing this Wednesday.
Short said Haspel was unsure if the CIA wanted to go through “the same stories from a decade ago,” which led to her to be summoned to the White House late last week. Haspel, who has been with the agency for three decades, briefly ran a secret prison in Thailand where in 2002 alleged al Qaeda operative Abu Zubaydah was said to have been tortured.
According to the Washington Post, Haspel was so concerned about dredging up the CIA’s past that she offered to withdraw her resignation last week. That offer prompted White House press secretary Sarah Sanders to meet with Haspel at the agency’s Langley, Va., headquarters last week.
“There is no one more qualified to be the first woman to lead the CIA than 30+ year CIA veteran Gina Haspel,” Sanders tweeted over the weekend. Sanders said any Senate Democrat who opposes her nomination as “a total hypocrite.”
Haspel, 61, will appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday. She will need 50 votes to secure confirmation, and at least one Republican senator, Rand Paul of Kentucky, has already vowed to vote against her.
