Feinstein: Apple Making a Mistake in Refusing to Unlock iPhone

California's senior senator, Dianne Feinstein, says the stakes are high in the fight over whether Apple should help the federal government unlock an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino terrorists. The Democrat wants the Cupertino tech giant to help the Department of Justice.

Feinstein spoke Friday at an event held by the Public Policy Institute of California in Sacramento. She says her position on the Senate Intelligence Committee gives her perspective most people don’t have.

“And I can tell you it is a very dangerous world,” she says. “I can tell you that there is a war going on without a war being declared.”

Feinstein said the phone could provide valuable information about the Dec. 2 attacks that killed 14 people and wounded 22.

“We don’t know where everybody came from,” she says. “We don’t know if friends participated. We don’t know if it was directed from abroad, if there are others waiting.”

Apple CEO Tim Cook says the government's demand is an overreach of government power that could ultimately undermine consumer privacy.

Feinstein also serves on the Senate Judiciary Committee. And during her talk she touched on the debate over filling the current U.S. Supreme Court vacancy after the death of Antonin Scalia. She says the president is entitled to choose a nominee. And she says, historically, it’s taken an average of 68 days to confirm a Supreme Court justice.

“I believe very strongly that we can do this well within the 68-day margin,” she says. “That we can have somebody in place at the very latest by the middle of the year.”

Feinstein says leaving the seat open would amount to a shortening of justice.

The 82-year-old senator declined to say whether she’ll run for a fifth term in 2018. She told reporters her health is good, but she says no one knows what the future will bring.

“I have to be able to get something done,” she says. “If I can’t, it’s not worth it. If I can, if I can help people, it’s worth it.”

She has not made an endorsement in the current Senate race to replace Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer.