Katko: Obama plan to close Guantanamo Bay is irresponsible, risky

“And if, as a nation, we don’t deal with this now, when will we deal with it?”

Under Obama’s plan, roughly 35 of the 91 current prisoners will be transferred to other countries in the coming months, leaving up to 60 detainees who are either facing trial by military commission or have been determined to be too risky to release but are not facing charges. Prison officials have repeatedly said that USA prisons can handle these detainees without danger. “But 15 years after 9/11 – 15 years after the worst terrorist attack in American history – we’re still having to defend the existence of a facility and a process where not a single verdict has been reached in those attacks”. And that is this: once he submits his Guantanamo closure policy to Congress, the Republican-led House and Senate will reject it as unsafe to U.S. national security at a time when worldwide terrorism is at an all time high. Nearly 800 detainees reportedly passed through Guantanamo from 2001-2008.

Earlier this month, House Republicans awarded the Jones Day law firm a $150,000 contract to perform the legal work in case Obama tries to move Guantanamo detainees to federal prisons.

Attorney General Loretta Lynch echoed that sentiment in November, arguing the law “currently doesn’t allow” detainees to be transferred to the United States, and said the option “is not, as I am aware of, going to be contemplated, given the legal prescriptions”. He writes, “As secretary of state, Guantanamo was a heavy load to carry as I went around the world talking about human rights, talking about how you treat prisoners, talking about how you can’t have indefinite detention or the use of torture to get things out of people”.

Since it was established in 2002, more than 700 prisoners have been held at the Guantanamo detention facility. The closure plan does not identify a specific facility, though congressional language mandating the plan called for a location to be specified.

After visiting the prison in 2006, Cardinal Renato Martino, the then-president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, told the Italian wire news service ANSA that “it seems clear that human dignity is not being fully respected in that prison”.

In December of 2014, Secretary of State John Kerry met with the Vatican and sought their help in re-settling remaining detainees.

“The president’s presentation of a nine-page plan to Congress on February 23 represents one laudable last effort to keep that promise”. Under the president’s plan, those held at Gitmo would be transferred to a maximum security federal prison in the United States.

Ryan said Obama’s plan flouts a longstanding ban annually passed by Congress that blocks the president from transferring Guantanamo detainees to US soil.