Proponents of waterboarding weren’t too happy when the United States stopped doing it. Now President Donald Trump is on board with reinstating the torture method, despite numerous arguments that it’s inhumane.
Trump Supports Waterboarding
Secretary of Defense James Mattis opposes the use of waterboarding. During his confirmation hearing, he vowed to uphold current International Law that prohibits it as a way to force terrorists into telling their secrets.
While Trump agreed to abide by that decision, he said in an interview with ABC News:
“I’ve spoken as recently as twenty-four hours ago, with people at the highest level of intelligence, and I asked them the question. Does it work? Does torture work? And the answer was yes. Absolutely.”
Trump later spoke with Sean Hannity on Fox News. Proving that he’s not comfortable with calling an act of torture what it is, he told him:
“I mean, torture is real torture, okay? Waterboarding is, I’m sure it’s not pleasant, but waterboarding was just short of torture. When, you know, all of a sudden, they made it torture.”
Waterboard Volunteers
Several famous people have allowed themselves to be waterboarded. Mixed Martial Arts trainer Ed Clay went through it twice back in 2011. After suffering through both sessions, he looked at the camera and said:
“If you don’t think that’s torture, you’re stupid.”
Another man, right-wing radio host Erich “Mancow” Muller, once said that waterboarding isn’t really torture. He even thought it was as simple as throwing water on someone’s face.
Cameras filmed him being waterboarded back in 2009. After having him lie on his back, another man placed a rag soaked in water over his nose to prevent him from breathing.
In the video footage, which you can watch here, water is then poured out of a pitcher and over his face. Make no mistake about it: the person is supposed to feel as though they’re drowning.
Within six seconds, he jolted up and said:
“All right, that’s it, that’s it. All right.”
Mancow went on to say that he expected to last 40 seconds. The man pouring the water said most people last about 14.
Republican Senator Tom Cotton would also like to see us use waterboarding again. Soon after Trump won the election, Cotton said:
“But ultimately I would say that anything that American troops volunteer for, that radio DJs volunteer for, is not torture.”
In other words, Mancow wouldn’t have volunteered for it if it were truly a means of torture. Forget the fact that he quickly admitted it was, in fact, torture.
Watch this video of Trump saying he has no problem with waterboarding.
Feature Image: Screenshot Via Twitter
