Santa Clara County Supervisor Don Gage opposes extraordinary
rendition, the controversial CIA maneuver to send terrorist
suspects overseas where lax laws allow for interrogations to
include torture.
SAN JOSE
Santa Clara County Supervisor Don Gage opposes extraordinary rendition, the controversial CIA maneuver to send terrorist suspects overseas where lax laws allow for interrogations to include torture.
But on Tuesday, while other supervisors had no qualms about it, he stopped short of condemning a San Jose aviation firm that contracts with the CIA.
Gage’s was the only dissenting vote when the board of supervisors passed a resolution in support a proposed federal law, the Torture Outsourcing Prevention Act, H.R. 1352. The vote was 4-1 to adopt the resolution prepared by the county’s Human Relations Commission in lieu of a similar resolution prepared by the county executive.
HRC version’s first paragraph says that “Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc., a Boeing subsidiary whose San Jose office is located at 225 W. Santa Clara St. had been implicated in the handling of logistics for CIA’s ‘extraordinary rendition’ flights.”
Tuesday was the second time the supervisors visited H.R. 1352. The first time, on Nov. 13, they voted unanimously to support the bill. A letter was sent to the local Congressional representatives soon after the vote, Gage said.
In a news release, Supervisor Liz Kniss said, “I think it is clear that we all oppose torture and abhor the transport of persons to places where there is a great likelihood that torture will occur.”
Gage said he would have voted in favor of the county executive’s version, which doesn’t name Jeppesen Dataplan. Because he said he believes that more than one company works with the CIA on rendition flights, Gage said he “didn’t want to cloud the issue” by condemning one specific firm.
“That’s not our business, we’re the county of Santa Clara,” Gage said. “We should stick to county business.”
