Mukasey unsure on waterboarding

WASHINGTON - Attorney general nominee Michael Mukasey said Tuesday that waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques "seem over the line or, on a personal basis, repugnant to me" and promised to review the legality of all such techniques if confirmed.

But he told Senate Democrats he could not offer an opinion on whether waterboarding, which simulates drowning, is illegal torture, because he has not been briefed on the details of the classified technique and does not want to suggest that CIA officers who have used such techniques may be in "personal legal jeopardy."

It was unclear whether the answers would be enough to win endorsement from the Senate Judiciary Committee, where the torture issue has threatened to block the confirmation of Mukasey, who served for 18 years as a federal judge in New York.

Mukasey gave his answer in a four-page letter delivered Tuesday afternoon to Sen. Patrick Leahy,D-Vt., chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and the other nine Democrats on the committee.

Mukasey noted that Congress has not explicitly banned the use of waterboarding by the CIA, although the method was outlawed for use by the military in the Detainee Treatment Act of2005. That left room for interpretation as to whether waterboarding or any other technique is prohibited as "cruel, inhuman, or degrading" treatment, he wrote.

"Legal questions must be answered based solely on the actual facts, circumstances, and legal standards presented," he wrote. In the absence of knowing exactly how specific classified interrogation techniques have been used, he said, he did not want to offer legal opinions on "hypotheticals."

He pledged both to stand up to the president if necessary and to seek ways to protect the nationfrom terrorism.

"I would leave office sooner than participate in a violation of law," Mukasey wrote.

All 10 Democrats on the Judiciary Committee wrote to Mukasey last week asking that he clarify his position on waterboarding. "Your unwillingness to state that waterboarding is illegal may place Americans at risk of being subject to this abusive technique," the senators wrote.

The initial response Tuesday night from committee Democrats suggested that Mukasey had not assuaged their concerns.

"I remain very concerned that Judge Mukasey finds himself unable to state unequivocally that waterboarding is illegal and below the standards and values of the United States," Leahy said in a statement.

Another Democrat, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, said Mukasey had "spent four pages responding and still didn't provide an answer" to the question, "Is waterboarding illegal?"

Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the committee's top Republican, did not comment in response to the letter, said an aide, Blair Latoff.

Another Republican on the committee, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, praised Mukasey's response, saying:

"I think Judge Mukasey did himself some good with this letter. He helped his cause with me."

But Graham, a former military lawyer who said he believes that waterboarding is unquestionably torture, said he had "a couple of areas that I want to flesh out" before committing to vote in favor of confirmation.

The committee is to meet Thursday, but a vote at that time looked unlikely Tuesday night.

Waterboarding involves strapping a prisoner to a board tipped to lower his head, covering his face with cloth and pouring water over the cloth to produce a feeling of suffocation.

Information for this article was contributed by Scott Shane of The New York Times and Laurie Kellman of The Associated Press.