With the record of newly minted Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris being freshly scrutinized, one recently recalled item is her reaction to revelations several years ago of the torture of suspected terrorists who the CIA detained. As a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Harris was a leading interrogator of Gina Haspel, then-nominee for CIA director, regarding the torture issue. She eventually voted against Haspel’s confirmation. Another recent reminder of this black chapter in American history is the first public release of a photograph of the gaunt, naked body of one of the prisoners involved.

Harris’s firm stand regarding torture is admirable, as is a wider sentiment—by no means universal, but now held by many Americans—that torture is an unacceptable national security tool. The unacceptability involves the ineffectiveness as well as the immorality of the practice.

What was largely missing, however, from the focus on the Haspel nomination and what was going on inside CIA detention centers was how the torture reflected a broader condoning of “gloves-off” methods amid the wave of anger that swept across the nation after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Although the Senate committee’s report on the subject asserted that the CIA had misled Congress and the administration about the extent and success of the interrogation techniques, the use of torture was not kept secret from members of Congress and specifically members of the intelligence oversight committees, who could have objected at the time. However, in the prevailing post-9/11 mood, members quietly looked the other way (this did not involve Harris, who did not enter the Senate until 2017). It was only with the passage of time and the quelling of some of the rage that was the immediate reaction to the terrorist attacks that second thoughts about torture arose and became politically significant.

A similar pattern arose with some intrusive investigative powers that were hastily granted to law enforcement agencies in the aftermath of 9/11, but later—again, with the passage of time and a changing of national mood—many came to perceive as unjustified invasions of personal privacy. Harris’s California colleague in the Senate, the late Dianne Feinstein, who, as chair of the intelligence committee, spoke prominently about the torture issue, later acknowledged—to her credit—that Congress may have gone too far with some of its post-9/11 measures taken........

© The National Interest