In his 2010 memoir Decision Points , President George W. Bush said then-CIA Director George Tenet briefed him on torture techniques. The account is disputed by a former top CIA lawyer and the Senate report.

Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

The Senate Intelligence Committee report on Bush-era CIA interrogation and detention activities claims the former president was not briefed by the agency on the specific enhanced techniques used on terror detainees until April 2006.

"The Study asserts that the President was not briefed in a timely way on
program details," the CIA said in a June 2013 response to an inquiry made by the Senate Intelligence Committee. "While Agency records on the subject are admittedly incomplete, former President Bush has stated in his autobiography that he discussed the program, including the use of enhanced techniques, with then-DCIA Tenet in 2002, prior to application of the techniques on Abu Zubaydah, and personally approved the techniques."

"I decided to contact George Tenet after reading Bush's book," writes Rizzo. "We have remained in touch over the years, and I consider him a close and trusted friend. In November 2010, I sent him an e-mail in which I posed the question as directly as I could: Were Bush's assertions accurate? George's response was just as direct: He did not recall ever briefing Bush on any of the specific EITs."

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Paul Goodwin was set to be executed at 12:01 a.m. CT Wednesday, but state officials held off on the execution while awaiting word from the Supreme Court and governor. Update: Goodwin was executed at 1:25 a.m. CT Wednesday.

Missouri Department of Corrections

Paul Goodwin was executed by the state of Missouri, pronounced dead at 1:25 a.m. CT.

"Paul Goodwin invaded the home of Joan Crotts, a widow, and brutally killed her. While her family's feelings of loss will never end, at least they know her killer has paid the price for his actions."

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“You called me deporter-in-chief,” the president said before he was cut off by Fusion anchor Jorge Ramos.

Ramos asked Obama, "as you were saying, you already had the legal authority to stop deportations, then why did you deport two million people?"

"For six years you did it," he continued. "You destroyed many families. They called you deporter-in-chief."

Fusion / Via youtube.com

"You called me deporter-in-chief," Obama said, prompting Ramos to retort that it was actually Janet Murguia of the National Council of La Raza, an activist group, who used the phrase.

"But you could have stopped deportations, that's the whole idea," Ramos said.

"That is not true," Obama replied. "Listen, here's the fact of the matter."

"You could have stopped them," Ramos said.

"Jorge, here's the fact of the matter," Obama said. "As president of the United States I'm always responsible for problems that aren't solved right away." Obama then explained he regrets that millions of people were unable to obtain health insurance until the Affordable Care Act was passed and implemented.

"And those like you sometimes, Jorge, who suggests that there are simple quick answers to these problems, I think," Obama said before being cut off.

"I never said that though," Ramos replied.

"Yes you do," Obama shot back, "because that's how you present it, and I think when you present it..."

"But you had the authority," Ramos said.

"When you present it that way, it does a disservice," Obama said. "Because it makes the assumption that the political process is one that can easily be moved around, depending on the will of one person and that's not how things work."

Fusion / Via youtube.com

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Jennifer Garner, Julianne Moore, John Legend, and Shakira lend their voices to the White House initiative, each sharing a personal story of the role education played in their lives.

White House

WASHINGTON — With a series of slick, celebrity-voiced PSAs, the White House hopes to convince more parents to take advantage of early childhood education programs across the country.

The new PSAs, obtained by BuzzFeed News ahead of their official unveiling Wednesday at the White House Summit on Early Education, focus on the types of activities available with early childhood education programs and push for more government and private investment in them.

The administration has helped funnel millions to state early childhood education programs and plans to ask Congress to authorize more money for efforts targeted especially at so-called "high-need communities." Administration officials acknowledged Tuesday that getting those funds out of a Republican-controlled Congress could be a challenge.

"The challenge is, quite frankly, this has yet to become a truly bipartisan issue here in Washington, said U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. "And for all the success, we're so proud that we've invested north of $1 billion now, what still haunts me is the huge unmet need in state after state after state."

Duncan said he hoped the PSAs and the White House early education summit Wednesday will help convince Congressional Republicans to follow the lead of many Republican governors, who the administration says have embraced White House-led early education programs.

"This work began long before the election ever did. We've seen tremendous interest from, again, Republican and Democratic governors across the nation ... In the real world, this has become a totally bipartisan issue which we think is just fantastic," said Arne Duncan, U.S. Secretary of Education.

At the summit, President Obama, Vice President Biden and the leaders of a slew of private partners will meet at the White House to unveil the PSAs — part of a new effort called Invest In Us — aimed at increasing awareness for education programs across the country that advocates say can help the youngest underprivileged children match the educational performance of their counterparts born into better means. Business leaders at the summit are expected to announce hundreds of millions of dollars in new money for early childhood education programs.

The PSAs are not set for TV broadcast, but rather as part of a new online campaign led by Kris Perry, executive director at the privately-financed First Five Years Fund, an early-education advocacy group. In addition to her education advocacy work, Perry was a plaintiff in the federal challenge to California's Proposition 8, which helped legalize same sex marriage in the state.

In an interview with BuzzFeed News from the White House, Perry said that despite the buzzy focus on early childhood education from many of the biggest names in education reform, she still has to make the case that the programs are a worthwhile investment.

"We're still making the case that children under the age of five are being educated period. That it's happening in their lives all the time," she said. "I think the average person views education as something that happens in a school, with a desk and with a teacher at the front of the room, and it's really hard to make the case that kids at younger ages are going to benefit just as much if not more from being in a high quality provider network system than even an older child."

Watch the new early childhood education PSAs:

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The proposed congressional budget released Tuesday night prevents the Department of Justice from using funds to undermine state laws regarding medical marijuana.

Marcos Brindicci / Reuters

The amendment was introduced by California Reps. Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican, and Sam Farr, a Democrat, and was approved by the House of Representatives in May. It implies that DEA raids on medical marijuana patients in states where it is legal will stop.

The budget Senate proposal — which must still go back to the House for a full vote before it lands on President Obama's desk — would keep all but the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) operating normally through the end of the fiscal year in 2015.

The compromise bill was approved with Republicans agreeing to put off a fight with Obama over his immigration policies until February, when funding for the DHS is slated to run out, the Associated Press reported.

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The AFL-CIO’s sole police union sent a letter to the federation’s president about the issue.

Getty Images Alex Wong

WASHINGTON — As labor unions continue to rally in a call for justice over the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, the AFL-CIO's police union has sent a letter to AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka addressing their concerns over the rhetoric, hoping to bring it to heel.

The AFL-CIO confirmed it received a letter this week from Sam Cabral, the president of the International Union of Police Associations. The letter comes as other unions have condemned grand juries for not indicting the killers of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri and Eric Garner in New York City, and called for sweeping police reforms.

Neither IUPA nor the AFL-CIO would discuss the details of the letter, citing it as an "internal" matter. But a spokesman for the police union said they were frustrated there "wasn't much" they could do to help quell the anti-police narrative that's seemed to come to a boiling point nationwide.

"What we are doing is staying very, very close to all the reports that are coming in and gleaning through them," IUPA spokesman Rich Roberts told BuzzFeed News. "Trying to bypass all the emotion that's being generated."

Roberts noted that none of the officers they represent have been directly involved in any of the recent high profile cases.

Cabral and Trumka's difference of opinion on policing first came to a head this summer, when Cabral penned a couple of open letters defending the program that provides military-grade equipment to local police. Trumka, meanwhile, was calling for that program to be reigned in and signed on to a letter calling for a "federal czar" to oversee police departments.

In a statement sent after the grand jury decided not to indict Darren Wilson in connection with the death of Brown, Trumka said the "justice system is biased against communities of color" and called for more "fairness in policing."

Randi Weingarten, president of the AFL-CIO affiliated American Federation of Teachers, was arrested while protesting the Eric Garner grand jury decision.

"Coming after the grand jury's decision in Ferguson, Mo., this decision causes many in New York and around the country to question their faith in our criminal justice system," Weingarten said in a statement. "Make no mistake, we respect the difficult job our police do in keeping our communities safe, but the issue of excessive force must be addressed."

But some of the largest unions calling for police reform no longer fall under the AFL-CIO's umbrella, most notably the Service Employees International Union.

SEIU 1199 and SEIU 32BJ recently signed a letter calling on New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo to veto a bill that would make it more difficult for local governments to discipline police officers.

"The long and growing list of unarmed people of color killed by the police stands in stark contrast to our ideals as a nation," said George Gresham, president of SEIU 1199. "This is not a black issue or a brown issue or a white issue, this is a human rights issue."

During his final speech on the floor, Sen. Mark Udall called for CIA Director John Brennan’s resignation over his defense of the agency’s torture program. Udall also read conclusions of a still secret review of the program’s effects.

Susan Walsh / Via AP Photo

WASHINGTON — Outgoing Sen. Mark Udall revealed new details from a still classified report on the CIA's interrogation and detention program, using his farewell address on the Senate floor to call for CIA Director John Brennan's resignation.

The Democratic senator from Colorado revealed some of the conclusions of a 2009 review undertaken by then-CIA Director Leon Panetta, known as the Panetta Review, of the millions of documents the Obama administration had promised to pass on to the Senate Intelligence Committee. The existence of that review, which is still classified, was first revealed in December 2013 by Udall himself during an Intelligence Committee hearing.

The Panetta Review, Udall said, "directly refutes information in the Brennan Response, and in the few instances in which the Brennan Response acknowledges imprecision or mischaracterization relative to the detention program, the Panetta Review is refreshingly free of excuses, qualifications, or caveats."

Following the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee's report on the use of torture during CIA detention, Brennan defended his agency and pushed back on some of the claims made in the document. "While we made mistakes, the record does not support the Study's inference that the Agency systematically and intentionally misled each of these audiences on the effectiveness of the program," Brennan said in a statement.

"The Panetta Review found that the CIA repeatedly provided inaccurate information to the Congress, the president and the public on the efficacy of its coercive techniques," he continued. "The Brennan Response, in contrast, continues to insist the CIA's interrogations produced unique intelligence to save lives, yet the Panettta Review identifies dozens of documents that include inaccurate information used to justify the use of torture and indicates that the inaccuracies it identifies do not represent an exhaustive list."

Udall also listed other areas in which the Panetta Review agreed with the findings of the Senate Intelligence Committee's report, including that detainees who proved cooperative were tortured anyway and that the CIA at times proceeded to torture before using other methods.

"The refusal to provide the full Panetta Review and the refusal to acknowledge facts detailed in both the committee study and the Panetta Review lead to one disturbing finding: Director Brennan and the CIA today are continuing to willfully provide inaccurate information and misrepresent the efficacy of torture," Udall concluded. "In other words, the CIA is lying. This is not a problem of the past, madam president, but a problem that needs to be dealt with today."

Though he praised the intelligence community overall, Udall called for Brennan's resignation.

"It gives me no pleasure to say this, but as I've said before, for director Brennan, that means resigning," Udall said. "For the next CIA director, that means immediately correcting the false record and instituting the necessary reforms to restore the CIA's reputation for integrity and analytical rigor."

“We’re not talking about anyone being burned or stabbed or cut or anything like that. We’re talking about people being made to stand in awkward in positions, have water put into their nose and into their mouth. Nobody suffered any lasting injuries from this.”

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Rep. Peter King says the 525-page Senate report on the CIA's interrogation and detention techniques does not detail torture, but instead just procedures that create what King described as "tremendous discomfort."

Speaking with both local radio and NewsMaxTV's America's Forum Wednesday, the New York Republican added it would be a crime if we didn't take these actions and that those who support the release of the Senate's scathing report have an attitude of "hate America first," "self-loathing," and "self-hatred."

"I don't believe these are torture at all. For instance, waterboarding, there were medical personnel present during the whole time. It creates tremendous discomfort — there's no doubt about it. It creates tremendous fear, but the fact is there was no lasting damage to these people and we got information from them, which is very helpful," King Told W-CBS in New York.

"We're not talking about anyone being burned or stabbed or cut or anything like that. We're talking about people being made to stand in awkward in positions, have water put into their nose and into their mouth. Nobody suffered any lasting injuries from this."

The Senate report details 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah nearly drowning to death during some of their many waterboarding sessions. Zubaydah also lost his left eye during his detention with the CIA. In one instance, a detainee, Gul Rahman died in CIA custody.

In an interview with NewsmaxTV's America's Forum, King said it would be a crime if the methods detailed in the report hadn't been carried out, implying it could have prevented the Sept. 11 attacks.

"Listen, you know — you were down here on Sept. 11. You know what it was like, afterwards. The fear, and the legitimate fear that we were going to be attacked again. And the CIA was being criticized for not having gotten enough intelligence beforehand," King said.

"And, I, you know — not to oversimplify it, but to put it in the starkest terms: If we had captured Mohamed Atta on Sept. 9 or Sept. 10, 2001, and we knew that somewhere, within the next day or two, 3,000 Americans were going to be killed in a terrorist attack. And they would't have to jump out windows, they wouldn't have to be burned to death, if we could find out where that attack was gonna be. Are you saying that we would not have held Mohamed Atta's head under water until he told us where that was gonna be because that would be a crime against humanity, that would be a war crime? To me, the crime would be if we didn't do it."

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The deal on federal spending was negotiated by Senate Democrats and House Republicans.

Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

WASHINGTON — House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday some of the provisions inside the government funding bill released Tuesday night caught Democrats by surprise, and now some members may pull their support for the bill.

With just one day left to fund the government and avoid a shutdown, Pelosi urged Republican leadership to remove two provisions in the omnibus spending package — one that aims to undo a key aspect of Dodd-Frank and another that allows individuals to contribute a significantly higher amount to campaign committees.

Pelosi dodged a question from reporters asking if she was calling on Democrats to vote against the bill if those provisions are not removed, but said her caucus is "concerned."

"We only saw the bill, certain aspects of the bill and the language of the bill last night. And when we saw that and learned further about the money piece, that was brand new," Pelosi said. "The other one we knew, like, for one day. This one was brand-new. Our members are very very concerned about it."

Because the spending bill does not include a rider to defund President Barack Obama's immigration executive order, many conservatives have vowed not to vote for it. So Republicans are relying on Democratic support to get the bill passed.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat who sits on the Banking Committee, said he will not vote for a bill with those two provisions in it.

"Putting these provisions in the bill is everything that's wrong with the political process right now," Van Hollen said.

Rep. Sandy Levin, also a Democrat, said it was "inexcusable" for negotiators to agree to those provisions.

But according to a top aide to Speaker John Boehner, Republicans remain confident in the bill they put out.

"Those provisions, like the entire bill, were the result of a bipartisan, bicameral process," Boehner spokesperson Michael Steel said. "If Representative Pelosi doesn't think her negotiators did a good job, she should discuss it with them. But sour grapes doesn't mean she gets to rewrite the deal after the fact."

Georgia Rep. Hank Johnson vows to renew his legislation to keep military weaponry away from local police forces next Congress, says President Obama could have done more to stop the flow.

WASHINGTON — The House Democrat pushing for so-called police demilitarization legislation said Wednesday that another incident like the one in Ferguson, Missouri would have to occur before politicians act on the issue.

"Unfortunately I wouldn't be surprised if we see another Ferguson or another example somewhere in this country that highlights the over militarization of local law enforcement agencies," Georgia Rep. Hank Johnson said Wednesday on a conference call with youth advocates.

Johnson vowed to reintroduce legislation regulating the Defense Department's 1033 program — the structure that transfers, free of charge, surplus military gear to local police forces that request it — in the new year. Despite bipartisan support, Johnson's existing bill collapsed as members shifted away from police militarization ahead of the 2014 midterms.

Responding to questions from BuzzFeed News, Johnson applauded the Obama administration's plan announced earlier this month to study police militarization and require more training programs and data collection by police forces that benefit from federal programs.

But Johnson said Obama could have gone farther, by using his executive authority to ban the transfer of combat gear from the 1033 program, limiting it — as Johnson's bill does — to the other, non-combat forms of surplus that make up the bulk of the transfers. Johnson took issue with the White House's focus on training while defending the programs themselves, saying that the transfers need to be banned or at least heavily regulated.

"We need to stop the flow of surplus military weaponry directly from the battlefield to the law enforcement agencies," he said.

The deadline to pass a bill to fund the government is Dec. 11.

Getty Images Win McNamee

WASHINGTON — Some senate Democrats are discussing the possibility of a "coordinated effort" to vote against the bill to keep the government open, according to one senator involved in those discussions.

Speaking on a call with reporters, Sen. Jeff Merkley said he and other Democrats are weighing their options on whether or not to vote for the omnibus spending bill outlined Tuesday night. Democrats, particularly progressives, have lambasted the omnibus spending bill in its current form because of language undoing a key part of Dodd-Frank.

"I'm certainly entertaining that possibility," Merkley said. "But the big point I'm making right now is to draw as much attention to it as possible."

Other Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Elizabeth Warren have also called for the removal of the language. Pelosi was noncommittal about whether she'd ultimately vote for the bill — she dodged a question when a reporter asked about it Wednesday afternoon.

Progressive groups and labor unions have called on members of Congress to vote against the bill in its current form.

The bill is a product of negotiations between Senate Democrats and House Republicans. Because the bill does not include a rider to defund President Barack Obama's executive order on immigration, some conservatives have said they won't vote for the bill either.

Meanwhile, House Republicans have said they remain confident the legislation, in its current form, can stand.

The deadline to pass a bill to fund the government is Dec. 11.

“And I would just take issues with him on the notion that the enhanced interrogation that we’re talking about here is torture.”

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Republican Rep. Trent Franks of Arizona says Sen. John McCain is wrong on torture, even though the Arizona senator was tortured during his five-and-a-half-year captivity in Vietnam.

McCain broke with the majority of his colleagues on Tuesday, praising the release of the Senate Democrats' 525-page report on CIA interrogation and detention activities.

"I so respect Senator McCain's service to this country and no one certainly knows more about torture than he does and so I recognize that," Franks said on KTAR Tuesday evening. "And I would just take issues with him on the notion that the enhanced interrogation that we're talking about here is torture."

The Senate Intelligence Committee's report, released on Tuesday detailed cases of hummus being inserted into a detainee's rectum, instances of waterboarding that led to near death, the death of a detainee in CIA custody, and extreme sleep deprivation, among other details.

McCain said the report's findings were a "stain on our national honor" and "the use of torture compromises that which most distinguishes us from our enemies."

Marlon Marshall, a field operative with ties to the person who could manage a Clinton campaign, is leaving his role as a key White House aide.

Marlon Marshall, pointing at right, chairs a White House meeting in February.

Bill O'Leary / Getty Images

A veteran field organizer who is considered to be a contender for a senior position on Hillary Clinton's possible presidential campaign is leaving his job at the White House, according to three people familiar with the departure.

Marlon Marshall, 35, worked for Clinton during the 2008 primary election as the field director in three key states. There, he served as a right-hand to Robby Mook, the operative many name as their top pick to manage another Clinton campaign.

Marshall arrived at the White House last September.

His lengthy official title — special assistant to President Obama and principal deputy field director of public engagement — obscured a fairly direct mission: to apply his campaign experience as a field organizer to an effort to promote the president's health care law in cities where the most people are uninsured.

Marshall is now transitioning out of the White House, the three sources said. Administration aides declined to provide a comment for the record.

Two people close to Marshall said he will likely return to 270 Strategies, the consulting firm he helped found last year. Marshall took a leave of absence from the company to accept the White House position, but he is still a partner. Before forming the firm, he was the deputy field director on Obama's reelection campaign.

Marshall, who is on his honeymoon this week, could not be reached.

Lynda Tran, a 270 Strategies partner and spokesperson, said in an email that Marshall will "always be a part of the 270 Strategies family. While we have yet to finalize any next steps — and we hope he is enjoying his honeymoon — we would be thrilled to welcome this brilliant grassroots strategist back to our team any time."

Marshall, a key member of the White House's health care team, was well regarded by his colleagues inside the administration and on the president's 2012 bid. He is known for signing off emails with a rallying cry and personal slogan — "Please believe" — and for energizing other campaign staffers during the reelection.

On Election Day in 2012, Obama aides woke up to a recorded wake-up call at 4 a.m. from Marshall, pushed to their phones by the campaign's robo-call system.

"Yo, today, time to make history," rang Marshall's voice. "Each of you kids come out and reelect the leader of the free world. For real talk: You can't do it unless you get yourself outta bed right now. Welcome to your Election Day wake-up call."

Now, Democrats watching the next presidential election begin to take shape said Marshall could also be making himself available for the next big job: 2016.

Clinton has not announced whether she will run for president a second time. After the midterm elections this fall, some advisers and former aides suggested she should launch a campaign, in some form, before the end of the year.

Much of that talk has quieted in recent weeks. Clinton has scheduled three paid speaking gigs for early next year — the latest is slated for the middle of March — and she appears to be soliciting advice about a campaign at a slow pace.

She met last week with Guy Cecil, another possible manager, as reported first in Politico. Clinton has spoken with Mook, too. But people close to Clinton have described meetings and conversations she's had as informal and preliminary.

If Mook does manage her campaign, should she decide to run, Marshall would almost certainly be involved. The two operatives are longtime political partners.

During Clinton's last campaign, Marshall and Mook started their field work in Nevada, then went to Ohio, then Indiana. Most of their team moved from state to state together, forming a tight but large friend group known as the "Mook Mafia."

The two strategists also worked together at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, along with Brynne Craig, who now works for Clinton as a scheduler and is said to have had a hand in coordinating the former secretary's of state's midterms events this year.

Last month, emails from "Mook Mafia" listserv were leaked to the press. ABC News published the messages, many written by Mook and Marshall.

The emails were innocuous — exchanges between a group of friends — but they provided a glimpse into the close-knit unit that could follow Mook, sometimes referred to on the listserv as "Deacon," into a Clinton campaign. (Marshall, meanwhile, was "Reverend.")

A person with access to the listserv said it has been dormant since the ABC story.

“That’s where waterboarding comes from.”

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Democratic Sen. Carl Levin says the Senate Intelligence Committee 525-page report on CIA interrogation and detention activities shows the United States emulated behavior of Chinese communists.

"We cannot engage in the kind of conduct which the Chinese communists engaged in in order to extract confessions, true or not, during the Korean war," Levin said on WSCR-AM radio Thursday. "That's where waterboarding comes from. And we can't emulate that kind of a conduct — not just for the moral reasons, although they're important — but because, again, we endanger our troops in situations where they're detained, or captured."

The retiring Michigan senator said such conduct puts our own troops in danger when they are captured.

"You can talk to our military leaders, talk to guys like General Petraeus, who will tell you that if we use torture — and that's what waterboarding is — we are risking our own troops," said Levin. "And we don't want to do that, because when our troops are captured we will go in, and if they're being tortured we will hold the torturers accountable in international crime courts."

As is noted in the report, after Levin became Chairman of the Armed Services Committee in January 2007, he set up an investigation that looked into the origins of detainee abuses. One area of focus of the investigation regarded how the military's Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape (SERE) training influenced our own interrogation procedures.

"SERE training is intended to be used to teach our soldiers how to resist interrogation by enemies that refuse to follow the Geneva Conventions and international law," a Levin press release notes. "In SERE school, our troops who are at risk of capture are exposed – in a controlled environment with great protections and caution – to techniques adapted from abusive tactics used against American soldiers by enemies such as the Communist Chinese during the Korean War."

White House gets behind spending measure that rankles his base.

Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

WASHINGTON — President Obama formally expressed his support Thursday for the bipartisan spending package on Capitol Hill that averts another government shutdown.

The president's support puts in him direct opposition to Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, who are threatening to not vote for the bill over provisions that would undo a key aspect of Dodd-Frank and allow individuals to contribute a significantly higher amount to campaign committees.

At the White House daily briefing Thursday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest drew a line between the administration and Warren and Pelosi.

"It's clear that we have a difference of opinion here," Earnest said.

While the administration is officially opposed to the same riders Warren and her allies are, Earnest ticked off a number of reasons for Democrats to support the bill — including spending on Ebola, spending for early childhood education, and other funding streams — and issued a formal statement supporting it.

"There's ample reason" for Democrats to vote yes on the spending package, Earnest said.

This is a far cry from the last several weeks, when progressives have reveled in a White House that appeared willing to damn the GOP torpedoes and operate from the left. Obama announced sweeping new support for liberal priorities like climate change, net neutrality and immigration.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, from Massachusetts, has led a vocal liberal opposition to riders in the bill, while others on the left urged Democrats to withhold their votes from the spending package to get the riders stripped out.

On the House side, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said she was "disappointed" in White House support for the spending bill and said she would not whip support for the bill.

With Republicans set to take over Congress in January, the White House is showing it's ready to compromise, even if it's painful for Obama's liberal base.

"The president certainly didn't get everything that he wanted. If the president were writing this bill himself, this bill would look a lot different," Earnest said. "But it is a compromise and it does fulfill some of the — many of the top-line priorities that the president himself has long identified, and passing this bill and signing it into law would allow us to make additional progress against those priorities."

“There are some people in this country who don’t like the military, don’t like the intelligence community, and — as I saw a headline today say — they have 9/11 amnesia, like thinking it can’t happen again.”

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Rep. Mac Thornberry says supporters of the Senate Intelligence Committee's 525-page report on CIA interrogation and detention activities, released by Democrats Tuesday, are suffering from "9/11 amnesia."

"There are some people in this country who don't like the military, don't like the intelligence community, and — as I saw a headline today say — they have 9/11 amnesia, like thinking it can't happen again," the Texas Republican told KEYE radio.

Thornberry said a 9/11-like event "can happen again," saying it was "a dangerous thing to forget.

"Boy, that's a dangerous thing to forget, because it can happen again — there are people plotting and planning every day to attack us, to kill as many Americans as they can — and if it weren't for those people on the front lines, in the military, in the intelligence community, in law enforcement — you know, and they're getting beat up these days, too — that we would be in a much different place than we are."

The report details cases of hummus being inserted into a detainee's rectum, instances of waterboarding that led to near death, the death of a detainee in CIA custody, and extreme sleep deprivation, among other details.

I sent this email to BuzzFeed’s employees today.

I'm very, very proud to share with you all that BuzzFeed News's Greg Johnsen, John Stanton, and Kate Nocera have been awarded the Everett McKinley Dirksen Award for Distinguished Reporting of Congress this year.

The National Press Foundation, which gives the award, cited Greg's "magisterial account of a 60-word congressional resolution that authorized military action against those responsible for the 9/11 terrorist attacks. BuzzFeed captures the historic drama of that moment and all that has happened since. The details are unforgettable."

Greg's story, written while he was our Michael Hastings fellow, was all of those things. Original, stunning, and incredibly troubling. It benefited from the powerful platform you all have built and the resources you've earned us. It benefited in particular from strong and thoughtful editing by Steve Kandell and Miriam Elder.

But this wasn't just a single, gorgeous piece of work. It was a series of stories that had a profound impact on the high-stakes intersection of American politics and power. Greg's piece; aggressive and diligent follow-ups by two aggressive, smart, and deeply sourced Capitol Hill reporters, John and Kate, with Katherine Miller's committed editing, revived what had been a moribund conversation about the legality of a widening American war — one the 60 words Greg made famous had allowed to spread to places like Somalia and Libya. That conversation was a major theme of Congress this year, and is being debated on Capitol Hill this week as the year ends. There is a real chance that the legislation at the heart of Greg's story will be repealed as a result of it.

We don't write for awards — even for the Dirksen, which is one of the most competitive in the nation. We write for our readers across the web, and for the impact our journalism can have. But it is good to see our colleagues' great work, and its impact, recognized. And we should be proud that the quality of our work has beaten out that of the best competition, from the The New York Times on. We are the first digital outlet to win this award. More important: We are the first digital outlet to hit as hard as we do in the broadening range of spaces in which we work. And we are just getting rolling.

A final note: We started the Hastings Fellowship to honor Michael's memory, his fearless reporting, and his great storytelling. Greg, who is now on BuzzFeed News's foreign desk out of Istanbul, truly fulfilled that promise, and the mandate we set out to "challenge powerful institutions [and tell] stories that those in power have no particular interest in having told."

Congratulations you three, and let's keep at it.

Ben

“Yes, it’s enhanced interrogation but it’s nothing comparable at all to what McCain underwent in Vietnam.”

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Former New York Governor George Pataki says Arizona Sen. John McCain is wrong on the issue of torture and that the "enhanced interrogation" methods detailed in the Senate report are not comparable at all to what McCain experienced as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

"We don't engage in torture," Pataki said in an interview with Concord New Radio Thursday, in which he said he was considering a possible presidential bid in 2016. "That's a term that Feinstein and Obama use but that others have rejected. Yes, it's enhanced interrogation but it's nothing comparable at all to what McCain underwent in Vietnam."

"I understand, he was a hero. He behaved with incredible patriotism and personal bravery and we should give credit for that. But I think what Americans have done to try to get intelligence on those who'd attack us and kill innocent civilians and engage in brutal terrorist acts again remotely resembles that."

The former Republican governor added McCain was a member of the United States military and "subject when captured to the Geneva Convention." He added members of al-Qaeda, ISIS, and the Taliban were not subject those same laws governing the treatment of prisoners.

McCain broke with the majority of his colleagues on Tuesday and praised the release of the Senate Democrats' report saying torture was a "stain on our national honor" and "the use of torture compromises that which most distinguishes us from our enemies."

McCain's torture in Vietnam featured repeated savage beatings and rope bindings that has left him limited mobility in his arms.

"I know from personal experience that the abuse of prisoners will produce more bad than good," McCain said Tuesday.

The Senate Intelligence Committee's 525-page report details cases of detainees being waterboarded to near-death, days worth of sleep deprivation, a detainee chained to the ceiling while clothed in a diaper to go to the bathroom, rectal feeding and rectal rehydration, and a detainee spending more 10 days in a coffin-shaped box, among other details.

The CIA chief makes no mention of some of the most shocking revelations in the Senate’s report on CIA torture programs.

Larry Downing / Reuters

LANGLEY, Virginia — CIA Director John Brennan avoided some of the most uncomfortable terminology in a report released this week on the "enhanced interrogation techniques" used during the war, during a rare press conference on Thursday.

Brennan, who does not normally brief the press, addressed reporters at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, and defended the agency. He also said he believed the torture program crossed lines and said he agreed with President Barack Obama's decision to end it.

"In a limited number of cases, agency officers used interrogation techniques that had not been authorized, were abhorrent, and rightly should be repudiated by all," Brennan said in prepared remarks.

But Brennan's criticism of the "abhorrent" techniques was vague.

Asked to elaborate on which techniques he found abhorrent, Brennan notably did not mention by name "rectal feeding" and "rectal rehydration," two methods used on detainees that were revealed for the first time in the report, released this week by the Democrats on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Many of the other methods described in the report, such as waterboarding, had been previously known to the public.

"I cannot say with certainty that individuals acted with complete honesty," Brennan said. "There are clearly questions about why certain techniques were used, and to your question about which of those do I consider abhorrent, I think anything that went outside the bounds of those enhanced interrogation techniques — this agency went back and forth with Justice, with the White House, to make sure there was a clear understanding of what were going to be approved enhanced interrogation techniques and how they should be applied."

Brennan also avoided saying that the techniques counted as torture.

"I certainly agree that there were times when CIA officers exceeded the policy guidance that was given and the authorized techniques that were approved and determined to be lawful," Brennan said. "They went outside the bounds in terms of their actions as part of that interrogation process. They were harsh. In some instances, as I said, I consider them abhorrent. And I will leave to others how they might want to label those activities."

The SSCI Democrats' exhaustive report on post–9/11 use of torture on terror suspects by the CIA was released on Tuesday and contains many explosive revelations about CIA detention facilities around the world, how they were set up and maintained, and the treatment of the prisoners held there. The report also argues that the CIA lied about the value of the intelligence it was obtaining through torture.

Reporters were invited to a press conference at the CIA headquarters on Thursday, two days after the report was released, to hear Brennan's side of the story and to question him.

"Director Brennan was clear today that in stating that, 'In a limited number of cases, agency officers used interrogation techniques that had not been authorized, were abhorrent and rightly should be repudiated by all,'" a CIA spokesman said later on Thursday when asked if "rectal feeding" is included among those techniques Brennan finds abhorrent.

The spokesman referred BuzzFeed News to a section of the CIA's response to the Senate report that says that rectal rehydration was used in a medical context. The CIA's document says, "Medical personnel who administered rectal rehydration did not do so as an interrogation technique or as a means to degrade a detainee but, instead, utilized the well acknowledged medical technique to address pressing health issues."

The Labor Department has left many key questions, particularly related to transgender workers, unanswered. The department says “more guidance” will be forthcoming.

Labor Secretary Tom Perez (Photo credit: Jonathan Ernst / Reuters) and the new federal contractor rule published this week.

WASHINGTON — LGBT advocates say a long-awaited Labor Department rule to protect employees of federal contractors from sexual orientation and gender identity discrimination that was published this week lacks specificity and that further guidance from the department is needed.

"Given where the rule is at this point, guidance is critical moving forward," the Human Rights Campaign's legal director, Sarah Warbelow, told BuzzFeed News on Thursday.

Among the unanswered questions advocates have raised are why the rule includes no guidance on how employers can avoid taking discriminatory actions when an employee transitions at work, whether transition-related health care exclusions are still permitted under the rule, and how dress codes and sex-segregated facilities like restrooms and "dressing or sleeping areas" are to be addressed in light of the rule.

"What we hope, going forward, is that OFCCP will provide clear guidance on all of these outstanding issues, including things like dress codes, appropriate use of facilities, and even some other nitty-gritty details — like, when you say you can't discriminate against, for example, a trans person, that means that you have to respect people's names and gender pronouns," Warbelow said.

Mara Keisling, the executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, told BuzzFeed News there is "an urgent need" for more guidance "on a range of issues that make workplace protections real for transgender people."

The comments are the latest in a two-and-a-half-year struggle to get the department to act on protection of transgender workers.

The Labor Department, and specifically the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) within the department, issued the new rule as it was directed to do under an executive order signed by President Obama this past summer. Labor Secretary Tom Perez said on a conference call with activists and reporters that the rule will take effect in April 2015.

The struggle, however, began in April 2012, when the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruled that the Civil Rights Act of 1964's ban on sex discrimination in Title VII includes anti-transgender discrimination in a case brought by Mia Macy. OFCCP enforces Executive Order 11246, which bans federal contractors from discrimination, and, under OFCCP's policies, it defers to the EEOC's definition of sex in Title VII in its interpretation of the definition of sex in the federal contractor order.

Despite repeated questioning on the issue during the two years, OFCCP did not announce it would be protecting trans workers under the existing order until the day after the White House announced that Obama would be signing the new executive order. The Labor Department issued a directive applying that decision to the first order in August.

But after more than two years of this issue being on the table, many key questions about discrimination against transgender people in the workplace are not addressed in the new rule.

Emily Prince, a transgender activist and federal employee who blogs about transgender regulatory issues, pointed out, in her personal capacity, what she views as several unanswered questions, which BuzzFeed News summarized and asked the Labor Department.

"That's great that this is saying, 'Hiring, firing, demotion, those kind of things, you can't discriminate on the basis of gender identity,'" Prince told BuzzFeed News of the new rule. "But, frankly, Macy already said that over two years ago." She laid out the issues she thought were left unaddressed at her blog and discussed them in an interview with BuzzFeed News over the weekend.

Warbelow agreed with Prince, adding that, within the area of benefits, it's not just questions about transgender workers: "If you have a same-sex couple who is in a legal relationship, you must provide equal benefits," she said, noting that it shouldn't matter whether the state in which the employee is located recognized the marriage. "You want to make sure that in [such] a state, if the business is headquartered there, they have to understand that they have to provide spousal benefits. Because that's part of nondiscrimination."

In response to a question about the outstanding transgender issues, a Labor Department spokesperson said further guidance would be forthcoming, "as has been OFCCP's practice" with other rules.

"OFCCP intends to develop more guidance on these and other issues through consultation with the stakeholder community throughout the 120-day implementation period, and afterwards, as has been OFCCP's practice with other new rules it enforces, including Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act and VEVRAA," the spokesperson told BuzzFeed News. "Agency representatives will meet with stakeholders and colleagues, listen to questions, conduct education and outreach and provide compliance assistance in written and other forms."

Prince, though, said that misses the point — noting that the Labor Department issued internal guidance for the office more than a year ago in order to advise Labor Department employees on how to avoid discrimination against transgender employees.

"This was a big press event," Prince said of the rollout for the new rule, which included a press package available on its website and a conference call with senior department officials and even White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett.

"They wanted to discuss this, but they didn't have anything substantive ready to discuss. They missed an opportunity where they could have said, 'Here are some of the issues that the transgender community faces, here are some issues that people with non-binary gender identities face in connection with employment,' and explain the problems, explain what's expected of people, and take that press coverage that they were getting and use it to make steps forward."

Warbelow echoed Prince's point, noting, "What it means to experience discrimination is so broad and it manifests itself in so many different ways, and the general public doesn't have a clear understanding of what that is."

The lingering questions about transgender discrimination are particularly relevant given that federal contractors already are barred from discriminating against transgender workers following the August directive, even while further guidance is being developed over the next 120 days.

"We need guidance around issues including access to sex segregated facilities, dress codes, time off from work for medical treatments, hostile work environments," NCTE's Keisling said, adding that the Labor Department is not alone on this front. "We also need clarification like this from other agencies like the [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission], [Office of Personnel Management], and others."