President Barack Obama seems to have won over enough Congressional Democrats to push forward with his plan to move Guantanamo prisoners to a facility in rural Illinois, but the official announcement Tuesday triggered a firestorm of criticism that could undercut his stated goal of depriving Al Qaeda of a key propaganda point.
“In taking this action, we are removing from terrorist organizations around the world the recruiting tool that Guantanamo has come to symbolize,” National Security Adviser James Jones told reporters.
“Today’s announcement that the federal government will acquire the Thomson Correctional Center in Thomson, Illinois, to house federal inmates and a limited number of detainees from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is an important step forward as we work to achieve our national security objectives,” another top administration official said in a conference call with reporters.
But some critics said they feared that the Illinois facility, like the one in Cuba, could end up being a place where detainees are held indefinitely without trial.
Asked whether the proposed prison might be billed as an “Illinois Gitmo” to rally extremists against the United States, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said, “not in any way, shape, or form nearly to the degree that currently exists.”
Republicans also blasted the proposal.
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) called the plan “preposterous” and said it showed the White House “must’ve forgotten” the September 11 terrorist attacks.
“I think the administration wasn't around for 9/11," Boehner said after emerging from a weekly meeting with House Republicans. Obama administration officials called the remark ludicrous.
“It’s dangerous and indefensible approach,” said Liz Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney. “When you bring these terrorists onto U.S. soil, you give them all the rights of US citizens.”
The White House emphasized the economic benefits of the move, which officials said could bring 3000 jobs to the prison’s environs and has the support of both of the state’s senators and its governor. Administration officials also underscored the tight security the new site will offer.
“Thomson was already built to maximum-security specifications by the state,” a senior administration official said. “It’s a 146-acre reservation. It’s got dual-sided electric stun fencing, hundreds of cameras on a fiber-optic surveillance network, armed outer and perimeter towers…When the Defense Department comes in it would add additional upgrades to those, including additional perimeter fencing.”
But Kirk Lippold, commander of the U.S.S. Cole when it was attacked by terrorists in 2000, said Obama was unwisely inviting all the dangers of Guantanamo onto U.S. shores.
“The Administration is now adding economic manipulation to its bag of tricks to convince the American people that somehow they will be better off if terrorists are held and tried in our towns and communities, instead of a state-of-the-art detention facility built for that purpose,” Lippold said. “Gitmo North is not the answer.”
Said Cheney: “Americans did not elect President Obama to usher terrorists onto the homeland and call it a jobs program.”
And many members of the Illinois delegation, including Rep. Tim Johnson (R-Ill.), said the move could make Thomson a "ground zero" for attacks.
"What can be a more dramatic victory for terrorism than a attack on this facility with these prisoners," Johnson said. “I mean you talk about ground zero, then Illinois becomes, actually, the ground zero for international terrorism.
Administration officials said they planned to seek an as-yet unspecified amount of funding from Congress, along with a change to current law which only allows the transfer of prisoners for trial, not for open-ended detention. The Thomson site would house prisoners facing trial before military commissions, as well as the commission proceedings themselves.
The White House declined to say how many Guantanamo inmates would be sent to Thomson. Following a briefing at the White House, Democratic Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin said it would be “fewer than 100.”
“We believe this is in service to our country,” said Durbin who noted that Obama was directing the prisoners to his home state. “This is a great opportunity. Our state unemployment numbers are 11%...People are desperate for good jobs.”
Guantanamo caused some of the new administration’s most stinging legislative defeats—a series of lopsided Congressional votes in the spring against Obama’s still-vague closure plans. But White House officials now appear confident that the specifics of the Illinois proposal will assuage those fears and win enough backing to survive a potential filibuster by Senate Republicans.
“We are making progress slowly but surely,” said a White House official tracking the lobbying.
While some Democrats, such as Sens. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) and Jim Webb (D-Va.), have continued to express reservations, at least two Republicans, Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.), support the general idea of moving prisoners from Guantanamo to the U.S. mainland. But in separate statements Tuesday, both Graham and McCain signaled dissatisfaction with the administration’s strategy.
Unexpected criticism of the proposal also came from human rights advocates who favor Guantanamo closure but expressed concern that, for some terror suspects, the Thomson site could become a gulag for open-ended detention without trial. Administration officials downplayed that prospect Tuesday, calling it uncertain and “a last resort.”
“I worry a lot that they are creating the conditions for an indefinite detention regime inside the United States,” said Sarah Mendelson of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who said that the White House was losing sight of why Gitmo became a symbol of oppression.
“It’s the whole concept of Guantanamo as a place where people are detained without charge indefinitely—that’s what has been problematic,” she said. “Having that then go to Illinois, even with bells and whistles like a review board, strikes me as really a sleight of hand in closing Guantanamo….This is not the way to close Guantanamo, I’m afraid.”
Strikingly, the American Civil Liberties Union sought to tar Obama’s Thomson plan with the exact same phrase Lippold and other conservative critics used: “Gitmo North.”
“Shutting down Guantanamo will be nothing more than a symbolic gesture if we continue its lawless policies onshore,” ACLU executive director Anthony Romero said.
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Jake Sherman contributed to this story.
Critics rail against 'Gitmo North'
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