Soufan resigned from the FBI in 2005 and founded the Soufan Group. He continues to be frequently called upon to serve as an expert commentator. Soufan was a former member of the
Homeland Security Advisory Council.
Senate testimony On May 14, 2009, Soufan testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee for its hearing on torture. The hearing followed President
Barack Obama's declassification of what is known as the "
torture memos". Most notably, Soufan claimed in his testimony that his
interrogation of Abu Zubaydah had resulted in actionable intelligence, such as the identity of convicted terrorist
José Padilla; and that thereafter, when
waterboarding was performed on
Abu Zubaydah, the flow of intelligence stopped. Soufan's statement contradicts the one made in the "torture memos", which were intent on making a legal case in favor of—and justification for—the use of waterboarding and other so-called "
enhanced interrogation techniques" (EITs). Soufan re-stated his claims in an April 22, 2009, op-ed for
The New York Times entitled "My Tortured Decision", which was published shortly after the memos were released, and similarly two months later. However, in turn, Thiessen's argument is contradicted by the 2008 Department of Justice's Inspector General Report, which quotes FBI sources stating that "Zubaydah was responding to the FBI's rapport-based approach before the CIA assumed control over the interrogation, but became uncooperative after being subjected to the CIA's techniques." Soufan's argument was also supported by the
CIA Inspector General's 2004 Report into the program. After investigating claims about the effectiveness of enhanced interrogation techniques, the report stated that while the regular interrogation approach achieved many successes, "measuring the effectiveness of the EITs, however, is a more subjective process and not without some concern." The Department of Justice's Office of Professional Responsibility report, published July 29, 2009, states that "the CIA Effectiveness Memo provided inaccurate information about Abu Zubaydah's interrogation." The CIA memo stated that "Zubaydah's reporting led to the arrest of Padilla on his arrival in Chicago in May 2003." However, the OPR report states, "In fact Padilla was arrested in May 2002, not 2003," and so "the information 'leading to the arrest of Padilla' could not have been obtained through the authorized use of EITs." In 2020, the CIA declassified more of his memoir, which was reprinted in a revised edition.
Bloomberg op-ed criticizing Jose Rodriguez On May 8, 2012,
Bloomberg News published an op-ed by Ali Soufan criticizing a book recently published by former CIA official
Jose Rodriguez. ,
Michael G. Masters is President of the center, while Naureen Chowdhury Fink is the executive director.
Jamal Khashoggi Memorial Jamal Khashoggi, a journalist with
The Washington Post, and an expatriate from
Saudi Arabia, who had stirred the ire of the Saudi government, was a friend of Soufan's. When Khashoggi was assassinated in October 2018, Soufan helped erect a memorial to him in Washington DC.
Threats In May 2020, CIA officials contacted Soufan to inform him they were monitoring al-Qaeda militants who were plotting against him. He also started to receive threatening messages via social media. Cybersecurity experts hired by the Soufan Group determined the social media threats were orchestrated not by al-Qaeda, as the CIA claimed, but by the same Saudi government officials who had targeted his friend Jamal Khashoggi, prior to assassinating him. ==In popular culture==