What鈥檚 next for the prison at Guant谩namo?
Attorney General Jeff Sessions endorsed bringing in new detainees at the Guant谩namo聽Bay facility in a radio interview on Thursday, saying he saw it as a 鈥渧ery fine place鈥� to hold newly captured enemy combatants.
The remarks turn attention onto how the Trump administration could seek to reestablish what former President Barack Obama saw as a symbol of 鈥�.鈥澛�
鈥淓ventually, this will be decided by the military rather than the Justice Department. But I see no legal problem whatsoever with doing that,鈥� .
鈥淲e've spent a lot of money fixing it up. And I'm inclined to the view that it remains a perfectly acceptable place. And I think the fact that a lot of the criticisms have just been totally exaggerated,鈥� he added.聽
President Trump is聽 that would send fighters from the self-proclaimed Islamic State, Al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated forces to Guant谩namo聽鈥� a constant feature of several drafts, which at times included reopening CIA prisons and using interrogation techniques harsher than those included in the Army Field Manual, according to The New York Times.
Mr. Trump has for some time vowed a big expansion of Guant谩namo, saying on the campaign trail that he would 鈥�.鈥� And , he suggested he favored trying US-citizen terrorist suspects arrested on the mainland using military commissions at Guant谩namo.
鈥淚 know that they want to try them in our regular court systems, and I don鈥檛 like that at all. I don鈥檛 like that at all,鈥� Trump told the newspaper. 鈥淚 would say they could be tried there, that would be fine.鈥�
That would amount to a radical reversal in policy for a facility where detainee expatriations have whittled numbers down to a core of several dozen whom a review board says cannot be released, yet have not been charged with any crime.
Secretary of Defense James Mattis was a vocal critic of Mr. Obama鈥檚 plans to transfer and release detainees, arguing that they should be held indefinitely until hostilities have ended 鈥� a status quo that some see as a violation of international law. But he has not echoed Trump鈥檚 apparent advocacy of extending the scope of military justice to terrorist suspects in the United States.
Whether courts might uphold such a plan is another question.
鈥淭he correct answer to that is, no, because the Constitution鈥檚 Treason Clause makes clear that citizens who act as an enemy are to be treated under criminal law,鈥� says Madeline Morris, former State Department adviser on international and counterterrorism law who now directs the Guantanamo Defense Clinic at Duke Law School.聽
In any case, she adds in an interview with 海角大神, 鈥渢hat issue would be thoroughly litigated.鈥�
For Obama, the presidency-long struggle to close Guant谩namo聽seemed to mean tilting the US away from post-9/11 militarism and toward more of a criminal justice-oriented approach, even if many supporters of the idea described the human rights abuses that took place at the prison in more emotional terms.
It was something of a lonely battle: even most Democrats were opposed to transferring detainees to US prisons, and in 2012, Congress passed a law banning it. Much of the public is uneasy about it, too: in a CNN/ORC poll from last March, including 83 percent of Republicans.
Conversely, his detailed, last-ditch plan to close it in 2016 drew criticism from civil-liberties advocates who saw the transfer of some inmates to the US for indefinite detention as the importing of an illegal system onto the mainland.
鈥淭he聽infamy of Guant谩namo has聽never been its physical location but that underpins it,鈥� Omar Shakir, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights, told the Intercept last February.
But the legal definitions that allowed the Bush administration to bring detainees there from battlefields in Afghanistan and Iraq could largely apply to new detainees 鈥� like IS fighters from Iraq and Syria.
鈥淭here would not need to be any change made in order for detainees to be held there,鈥� says Ms. Morris.
In a December report, the Obama White House for why a preexisting Authorization for Use of Military Force聽(AUMF) allows the US to use force against Islamic State militants. That means IS fighters could be taken to Guant谩namo聽for detention, too, she says.
"If you can use force in the sense of an armed conflict, then you can certainly take prisoners."
