Steny Hoyer: Senate correct to release interrogation report now

“I don’t know if there’s ever a good time to release a report like this,” Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland told reporters. “I don’t know that there’s ever a time when things are so calm, and particularly in the foreseeable future, that [waiting for a better time] in and of itself should be a reason not to disclose.”

Hoyer said the Senate Intelligence Committee, which authored the report, has a responsibility to inform the public as to the extent of the extreme forms of interrogation techniques used by U.S. officials on suspected terrorists in the months and years after the Sept. 11 attacks, including sleep deprivation, confinement in small spaces, humiliation and the simulated drowning process known as waterboarding.

The report’s Tuesday release has fueled an intense debate in Congress, with some lawmakers arguing that it will prevent the future use of extreme methods of interrogation while others argued that it will only give extremists around the globe more reasons to threaten the lives of Americans overseas.

And Kerry had pressed committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., to hold off releasing the report, arguing its release could damage relationships abroad at a particularly sensitive time.

Hoyer said that steps must be taken to ensure that the report doesn’t publicly disclose so much that it would pose a threat to U.S. intelligence officials engaged in counterterrorism efforts.

“We have to balance that,” he said. “I am in favor of getting this report out and debat(ing) it. I think, though, that it would be Pollyanna-ish not to say that we ought to not make care to respond to concerns about putting individuals at risk, particularly those that are deployed overseas.”

This story first published at 1:05 p.m. and has been updated since then.