Dear Friends:
Late last year, the House of Representatives passed important anti-torture legislation as Section 327 of H.R. 2082, the Intelligence Authorization bill. Section 327 would require all elements of the intelligence community, including the CIA, to abide by the restrictions in the Army Field Manual while conducting interrogations. The Army Field Manual prohibits torture and many of the “enhanced interrogation techniques” being used by the CIA.
Unfortunately, some Republican Senators have threatened to obstruct passage of H.R. 2082 as long as it contains Section 327 (the anti-torture provision). Passage of Section 327 is one of the most important actions Congress can take to stop U.S. sponsored torture. We need to do everything we can to win passage of Section 327 in the Senate. Defeating the attempts to block H.R. 2082 or to strip Section 327 from the bill will take 60 votes. We need your help.
The best information we have is that the Senate could vote on this in the first two weeks of February. We ask that you - in the last two weeks of January:
- Contact - by phone or by email - your Senators to express your support for Section 327 of H.R. 2082. You can contact your Senators by calling the Senate switchboard at (202) 224-3121, or you can look up their direct lines and their email addresses at http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm. We also have a form email prepared that you can send to your Senators. You can find our sample form email at http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2162/t/3805/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=21961.
- If you have a little more time, write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper. You can find a sample letter to the editor and instructions for writing and sending a letter at http://www.nrcatactionfund.org/pb/wp_18d08901/wp_18d08901.html?0.03150910613065028.
This legislation is very important to our efforts to stop U.S. sponsored torture. We hope you can take a few minutes to share your voice with Congress and your community.
Thank you for your concern, your time, and your efforts.
Sincerely,
Linda Gustitus, President
Richard Killmer, Executive Director
I have worked, petitioned, wrote every entity I could including Amnesty International, all my reps multiple times-
No one did a thing. I have been sickened by the whole thing
and am grateful others care enough to do the same.
Thanks for your comment, Kathy. What can I say? Senators and reps will do nothing because interrogating suspects humanely and according to international standards has been equated with “coddling terrorists.”
And no elected official wants to be accused of that…
The administration has been very successful in spreading an aura of fear and helplessness: we must torture - it is the only way to obtain information that will save lives.
Joining with others, such as NRCAT is, I believe, a good strategy. However, we must realize that we’re in it for the long haul. Torture has been researched and practiced (and taught to other countries) covertly by our government for quite a long time now (if you haven’t already read it, you might want to check out A Question of Torture, by Dr. Alfred McCoy). Now that torture is overt, the powers-that-be concentrate on justifying it and they have all the resources at their disposal to do it. So the roots go deep. It will take sustained effort over a long period of time to pull them up.
–grellet