Closing the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has been a priority for President Obama since the day he took office, if not before. But he has not been able to do it, largely because Congress hasn’t let him. Bill after bill has been passed tying his hands. President Obama will be sending a plan to Congress to get approval to close the detention center, but that would require the transfer of some detainees to prisons in the United States, and Congress isn’t cooperating. This is from an article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal:
“[L]awmakers have settled on legislation continuing a ban on transferring detainees to the U.S. through 2016.
The House is scheduled to vote on that bill, the National Defense Authorization Act, on Thursday [i.e., yesterday], to be followed by a vote in the Senate later this year. It is expected to pass both chambers.
Rep. Adam Smith of Washington, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, said Wednesday that Mr. Obama doesn’t have enough support in Congress for shutting the prison.
‘I’d like to close it yesterday, but we don’t have the votes,’ Mr. Smith said, noting there are provisions in legislation other than the defense bill that prevent closing the facility.”
So will Guantanamo stay open, given that Congress won’t agree to shut it and legislation prohibits it? Probably not. This is, after all, Barack Obama we are talking about. If he wants to do something, and if Congress won’t agree, he’ll do it by himself – and say it’s Congress’s fault for not doing what he wants.
If you think I am exaggerating, the article in the Journal continues:
“Mr. Obama could take executive action to circumvent Congress and close the facility unilaterally. The White House has been working on options for executive action, including legal justifications. Administration officials have been increasingly candid that it is a route the president is willing to take.
‘We would like to work with Congress where we can,’ White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Wednesday. But, he added, ‘I wouldn’t rule out the president using every element of his authority’ if Congress balks.”
In other words, President Obama is almost certainly going to close the detention center at Guantanamo bay before he leaves office, regardless of what Congress thinks or does – and regardless of what laws it may have been passed.1 Because when President Obama wants to do some thing, he doesn’t care about things like congressional consent, following proper procedure, and rule of law.
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PS Please understand that I am not talking about whether it is a good idea to close Guantanamo or not. I’m not sure on that. I am talking about how it should be properly done in a democracy under the rule of law.
1 If you wanted to be totally cynical, you would say that Guantanamo will be closed after November 8, 2016 (so it won’t hurt Democratic election chances) and before January 20, 2017.
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