Senate Democrats have blasted a former CIA director who dismissed Dianne Feinstein as “emotional”, marking a deepening fracture between Congress and the intelligence services over the use of torture and mass surveillance.

Ron Wyden, a member of the Senate intelligence committee, said on Monday that Michael Hayden's attack on Feinstein, the committee chairperson, was “outrageous” and fitted a pattern of “misleading” the American public.

It was some of the strongest language yet in the war of words between Congress, the CIA and the National Security Agency, complicating President Barack Obama's efforts to placate both sides.

The latest row broke on Sunday when Hayden, a former NSA and CIA director, said the Senate intelligence committee’s landmark report on torture and coercive interrogations was not objective because Feinstein, a California Democrat, was too “emotional”.

Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, defended her in a statement that launched a broadside against Hayden's credibility and honesty. “General Hayden’s suggestion that Chairman Feinstein was motivated by ‘emotion’ rather than a focus on the facts is simply outrageous. Over the past five years I watched Chairman Feinstein manage this investigation in an extremely thorough and professional manner, and the result is an extraordinarily detailed report based on millions of pages of internal CIA records, including operational cables, internal memos, and interview transcripts.”

The statement continued: “General Hayden unfortunately has a long history of misleading the American public – he did it on domestic surveillance when he was the head of the NSA and he did it on torture when he was the CIA director.”

Wyden, a leading voice in attempts to rein in NSA surveillance, said the former intelligence chief was part of a broader problem. “The best way to correct this culture of misinformation is to give the American people a chance to review the facts for themselves, and I’ll be working with my colleagues and the administration to ensure that happens quickly.”

On the Senate floor the majority leader, Harry Reid, called Hayden's comments condescending and symptomatic of Republican attitudes to women. "Does this sound like a person or party that respects women?"

Mark Udall, a Democrat who serves with Feinstein on the intelligence committee, called Hayden's remarks a sexist and "baseless" smear.

The committee voted last Thursday to declassify portions of a study into CIA use of torture on terrorist suspects following years of inquiry, $40m (£24m) in expenses and an unprecedented clash with Langley.

The 11-3 vote put the Obama administration back at the centre of an inherited controversy and has implications for the military tribunals of the 9/11 defendants at Guantánamo Bay, several of whom were subjected to such abuse.

Feinstein, a public champion of the investigation, called its findings "shocking" and said the CIA's behaviour was "in stark contrast to our values as a nation".

She has been involved in a public fight with the agency that has featured duelling accusations of criminal misconduct and constitutional usurpation. The CIA has branded the report misleading and factually inaccurate.