Senate aides say Harry Reid persuaded his Democratic colleagues to drop holds. | John Shinkle/POLITICO Senate confirms new CIA lawyer

The Senate voted abruptly Thursday to confirm a new general counsel for the Central Intelligence Agency, after senators apparently withdrew holds they had placed on the nomination over concerns that the spy agency was not cooperating with an ongoing investigation into Bush-era interrogation practices.

Justice Department lawyer Caroline Krass handily won confirmation to the legal job in a 95-4 vote just moments after Majority Leader Harry Reid obtained unanimous consent for an immediate vote.


Senate aides said the change-of-heart about confirming Krass to the CIA post came after several Democrats said they had grave concerns about recent actions by the CIA’s acting general counsel, Robert Eatinger.

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Reid persuaded his Democratic colleagues in recent days that an immediate way to address their lack of confidence in Eatinger would be to drop their objections to Krass’s nomination and allow her to take over the CIA’s legal shop, the aides said.

Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) said soon after the vote that he dropped a hold on Krass because of a need to change direction at the CIA.

“We need to correct the record on the CIA’s coercive detention and interrogation program and declassify the Senate Intelligence Committee’s exhaustive study of it. I released my hold on Caroline Krass’s nomination today and voted for her to help change the direction of the agency,” Udall said in a statement. “The president has stated an unequivocal commitment to supporting the declassification of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report. Coloradans expect me to hold him to his word.”

Eatinger recently sent the Justice Department a criminal referral notifying prosecutors that Senate Intelligence Committee aides may have violated the law in connection with their decision to move highly-classified documents from a CIA facility in Northern Virginia to the panel’s secure workspace on Capitol Hill.

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In a floor speech Tuesday, Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) blistered Eatinger over the referral, which came amidst a heated dispute over how the committee’s staff obtained the records and what they did with them.

“I view the acting counsel general’s referral as a potential effort to intimidate this staff, and I am not taking it lightly,” Feinstein said. While not referring to him by name, Feinstein suggested Eatinger had a serious conflict of interest because he was directly in providing legal advice for CIA’s interrogation program — the same program the Senate panel has been investigating for years.

“He is mentioned by name more than 1,600 times in our study,” Feinstein said.

In his statement Thursday, Udall echoed Feinstein’s charged that Eatinger had tried to intimidate Senate staffers with the criminal referral. Udall said the CIA lawyer should recuse himself from further decisions related to the program and from the agency’s dealings with the Intelligence panel.

Four conservative Republicans — Ted Cruz of Texas, Dean Heller of Nevada, Rand Paul of Kentucky and Tim Scott of South Carolina — were the only senators to vote against Krass.

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After the vote, CIA Director John Brennan welcomed Krass’s confirmation, but also went out of his way to defend Eatinger — even going so far as to name him publicly.

“I am extremely pleased that the Senate has confirmed Caroline Krass to be CIA’s next General Counsel,” Brennan said in a statement. “I have known Caroline for many years and can unequivocally affirm that she will be a terrific addition to Agency’s senior leadership team. Caroline possesses impressive legal acumen, sound judgment, and a thorough command of the national security challenges facing our country.”

“I also want to commend Bob Eatinger, who has served as Acting General Counsel in recent months. Bob is an exemplary public servant who has demonstrated throughout his career exceptional competence and integrity and has made numerous contributions to our Nation’s security,” Brennan added.

Krass, a longtime government lawyer who currently serves as a senior official in DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel, was officially nominated to the CIA post in November. She has a strong reputation as a top-flight attorney and has worked on the National Security Council as well as at the State Department.

However, at her confirmation hearing in December, Krass seemed to irritate senators when she said she opposed giving lawmakers access to Executive Branch legal opinions.

“Protecting confidentiality of that legal advice preserves space for their to be a full and frank discussion among clients, policymakers and their lawyers within the executive branch and really furthers the rule of law and allows for effective functioning of the executive branch,” she said.