Cheney says Obama should apologize to Bush administration after al-Awlaki killing

Former Vice President Dick Cheney says that following the killing of Anwar al-Awlaki, President Obama owes the George W. Bush administration an apology.

Cheney, speaking on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday, offered support for the targeted killing by drone strike last week of the Yemeni-American radical cleric al-Awlaki, but he said that Obama now needs to reverse his past criticism of how the Bush administration interrogated suspected terrorists.

The Obama administration "in effect had said that we had walked away from our ideals or taken policy contrary to our ideals when we had enhanced interrogation techniques," the former vice president said. Al-Awlaki's death indicates that members of the Obama administration "clearly have moved in the direction of taking robust action when they feel it's justified," Cheney said.

"You'd like an apology, it sounds like?" host Candy Crowley asked the former vice president.

"Well I would," Cheney responded, "I think that would be a--not for me--but I think for the Bush administration."

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"I think it was a very good strike. I think it was justified," Cheney added regarding the strike against al-Awlaki, CNN reports. But Cheney added, "I'm waiting for the administration to go back and correct something they said two years ago when they criticized us for 'overreacting' to the events of 9/11."

The Obama administration has been criticized by civil liberties groups and others, including Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, for authorizing the killing of al-Awlaki. These critics argue that, as an American, al-Awlaki had a right to due process.

The Justice Department reportedly issued approval for the CIA to kill al-Awlaki by concluding in a memo that he was not entitled to due process because he was a war combatant.

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