Republicans take over the Senate in just a few legislative days. And when they do, they will probably snuff out the last possibility of releasing a huge report on the use of torture by the Central Intelligence Agency during the Bush-Cheney Administration.

Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee prepared the report over the course of five years. Many of them are increasingly desperate to release it to the public. They know that, like most Republicans, the incoming chairman of the committee, Richard Burr of North Carolina, thinks the report amounts to a political hit job on the Bush years.



Mr. Burr has said the report is full of unspecified inaccuracies. He not only opposes its release, but also all public hearings of the Intelligence Committee. He believes that “enhanced interrogation” (also known as torture) helped lead to the death of Osama Bin Laden, and is O.K. with widespread domestic spying by the National Security Agency. So don’t expect the slightest bit of openness or progress after he takes over.

But the more immediate obstacle in the way of releasing the report isn’t Republicans; it’s the Obama administration. Deferring to the C.I.A., the White House has blockedDemocrats from informing the public as to how much torture went on in the previous administration, and how poorly it worked.

The tension boiled over on Thursday at a meeting between the committee members and the White House chief of staff, Denis McDonough. The administration is refusing to allow the report to be released if it includes pseudonyms for the C.I.A. officers who participated in the torture program, claiming that even fake names would endanger the officers. But without any name references, it’s impossible to follow the narrative thread of the report and understand who is doing what to whom.

Democrats said the name issue was absurd, and that the real motivation of the White House was clear.

“It makes a lot of people who did really bad things look really bad, which is the only way not to repeat those mistakes in the future,” Senator Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia told The Huffington Post. “The public has to know about it. They don’t want the public to know about it.”

With time running short, some committee members are mulling creative ideas about releasing the report on their own, possibly including simply reading it out loud on the Senate floor. Mr. Rockefeller said he feared any senator who tried that would be “grabbed” and hauled away. Presumably he’s referring to the exceptions in the Constitution’s speech or debate clause, which says members can’t be arrested while speaking in either chamber, except in cases of treason, felony and breach of the peace.

But someone — possibly Mark Udall, who will not be returning as a senator from Colorado — should consider testing that clause. Is it treason to inform the public how government officials broke international law and permanently stained the country’s moral reputation? It shouldn’t be.