WASHINGTON – Today U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) released the following statement in response to the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on the CIA’s detention and interrogation program.

This report makes clear what we’ve known for years. The ‘enhanced interrogation’ techniques used by the Central Intelligence Agency in the years after 9/11 clearly constitute torture, and should never have been authorized by an agency of the U.S. government. Chairwoman Feinstein and her staff have worked tirelessly to reveal the details of this program to the public, and I applaud their efforts. The CIA’s obstructionism and interference with a Congressional investigation have only demonstrated the urgent need for more robust oversight of our nation’s intelligence programs.

Now, it is important that this report does not go to the shelf to collect dust. Congress needs to step up and reclaim its role as a co-equal branch to the executive in setting American foreign policy. Torture, covert wars, and illegal surveillance more often than not harm, not enhance, our national security. America cannot be the world’s leader on civil liberties and human rights if our actions don’t match our rhetoric. When this gulf exists between what we claim to stand for, and what the world sees us do, it creates bulletin board material for extremist groups in their effort to recruit against us.

Congress needs to set a new course for this country in the world – a course that recognizes the mistakes of the past, like our torture practices of the past decade, and builds a better path for the future.