[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 74 (Thursday, May 14, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5461-S5463]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               GUANTANAMO

  Mr. BROWNBACK. Madam President, I rise to address an issue that is 
front and center for us. It is the Guantanamo Bay detainees. Tomorrow I 
will be leading a congressional delegation to Guantanamo to look at the 
facility there. We will bring this issue up--it will be up next week in 
the supplemental appropriations bill--the effort of the administration 
to close Guantanamo Bay, which most of the American public do not 
support. I realize it is quite popular in Europe to close Guantanamo 
Bay. I would hope we would start to get a more factual setting on this 
issue.
  I would also hope, and I would invite the administration to engage 
all of us here in the Senate--certainly I am willing to be engaged--
about what we can do with the detainees. They need to be treated 
humanely. They need to be treated appropriately under international 
conventions. They do not need to be brought to the United States.
  We do not have a facility in the United States to be able to hold 
these detainees in a way and in a situation that would be safe for the 
people of the United States. We are not prepared to release these 
detainees because we have found so many of them back on the battlefield 
after they have been released. So there is a quagmire that exists as a 
result of the administration's efforts to close Guantanamo Bay to 
please foreign detractors who I don't believe will be pleased, even if 
the facility is closed. They will complain about the next facility. I 
would invite them to work with us--the administration to work with us--
to come up with an acceptable solution to this difficult problem. I 
stand ready and willing to do that.
  To borrow a phrase from Winston Churchill, the administration's 
detainee policies seem to me to be a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside 
an enigma. The administration started with a confident announcement 
that military commissions would end and Guantanamo's detainee facility 
would be closed. But according to a report in Saturday's Washington 
Post, the administration is preparing to restart military commissions.
  That same report, however, also cited an unnamed lawyer who said that 
the new commissions would be held on American soil, probably at 
military bases. Such a move would be a first step toward permanent 
transfer of detainees to the United States. Apparently, detainees would 
be moved to the United States whether or not the new commissions would 
be able to prevent the release of terrorists in the United States. Such 
a policy is truly an enigma.
  I have not been briefed on these plans, and it is disappointing that 
unnamed lawyers apparently know more about the administration's plan 
than Members of Congress. The administration is famous for its 
willingness to talk with its opponents and have meaningful dialog on 
tough issues. I hope that desire to talk extends to detainee policy 
matters.
  Detainee policy is too complicated and controversial to make 
decisions behind closed doors and have them be made by one party alone. 
It needs to be a bipartisan approach. As I said in January, when the 
administration announced its plans to close Guantanamo Bay, I believed 
policy changes must be made openly and transparently and in a 
bipartisan fashion to be credible. So far we have had riddles, 
mysteries, and enigmas, but no clear sense of direction. Now the 
American people are skeptical of what is going to happen.
  A poll last month showed that just 36 percent of Americans agree with 
the administration's decision to close Guantanamo Bay. I am sure that 
number would be higher in Europe, but we don't represent the European 
people. Seventy-six percent oppose releasing detainees in the United 
States. Two weeks ago, Secretary of Defense Gates told the 
Appropriations Committee that he expects that every Member of Congress 
would oppose detainees being moved to his or her district or State. In 
fact, I learned in a written response from Secretary Gates yesterday 
that DOD will make no attempt to discuss detainee transfers with State 
and local officials until a final decision about where to put detainees 
is reached. As I said, the number was 66 percent opposing releasing 
detainees into the United States.
  If my constituents in Leavenworth, KS, are any indication of the 
level of American concern over the administration's mysterious plans, 
Secretary Gates is right to be wary about negative reactions to 
detainees in the United States. Folks in Leavenworth are quite 
comfortable with tough criminals living in nearby prisons, but they see 
detainees differently. They don't want terrorists coming into Kansas. 
We are not set up to handle terrorist threats because of detainees 
coming to Fort Leavenworth.
  The administration cannot and should not duck this debate. They need 
to tell the American people how their security is improved by bringing 
terrorists inside our borders. They need to be upfront about how 
detainees will be handled and where they will be housed.

[[Page S5462]]

Then the administration needs to listen to the American people before 
it charges forward.
  Of course, a national debate on this issue should be based on facts. 
Just after last year's election, I invited members of the Presidential 
transition team to visit Fort Leavenworth to see for themselves why it 
could not handle a detainee mission. Nobody visited. Nobody even 
responded.
  In January, I invited the President to Fort Leavenworth so he could 
hear the facts directly from the people who work and live at Fort 
Leavenworth. That invitation is still open.
  I tried to provide some facts to Attorney General Holder during his 
confirmation hearing. I noted that Fort Leavenworth's primary mission 
is education, and that many international students of the command and 
general staff college will refuse to participate in military education 
programs if detainees are nearby. This could harm the interests of our 
Nation. Unfortunately, Fort Leavenworth is still being considered as a 
detainee destination.
  I was pleased that Attorney General Holder made his visit to 
Guantanamo Bay in February and found out that it is, to use his words, 
``a professional and well-run facility.'' I would like for him to visit 
Fort Leavenworth, too, because the facts speak for themselves. It is 
not just that Fort Leavenworth should not have the detainees; it cannot 
take on this mission.
  The Missouri River forms the eastern border of the post. The city of 
Leavenworth wraps around the other three sides. There isn't enough 
space in the existing maximum security prison wing to handle the 
Guantanamo detainees. The post doesn't have a hospital. It doesn't have 
adequate legal facilities. The fact is, the Fort Leavenworth idea just 
doesn't work.
  In order to resolve all of the issues surrounding the Guantanamo 
detainees, we need a full debate with all of the facts available and 
everybody engaged. That means everyone needs to do their homework. I 
was pleased that our colleagues in the House rejected the 
administration's request for more than $80 million in supplemental 
funding related to closing the Guantanamo detention facility. The House 
Appropriations Committee chairman was absolutely right to demand that 
the administration come to Congress and defend a concrete plan before 
we consider this request. We should not be in the business of spending 
taxpayer money on hypotheticals, especially in a matter as significant 
as moving terrorists inside the borders of the United States.
  It is my hope that next week this body will vote on whether detainees 
should be moved to the continental United States.
  I hope that we would vote against such a move. I believe there would 
be a strong bipartisan vote against such a move.
  I am doing my homework as well, as I mentioned previously. I will be 
traveling to Guantanamo Bay tomorrow. I have been to Fort Leavenworth 
many times. I want to see what we have accomplished at Guantanamo with 
the more than $200 million in taxpayer funds in the last 8 years that 
we have spent on that facility. I want to understand what it takes 
exactly to operate a detainee facility that is ``professional and well 
run,'' to use Attorney General Holder's statement.
  When the supplemental reaches the floor, I hope we can have a full 
and informed debate over detainees. I hope we can agree to set aside 
the request for the funding of hypothetical detainee transfer plans. I 
hope we can agree that we are not ready to bring detainees to the 
United States. I hope we vote on that and send a clear message to the 
administration and to the American people, most of which oppose moving 
detainees to the United States.
  If we poll different States on whether that State wants detainees 
moved to their State, they are overwhelmingly opposed--the States are--
to moving detainees to their States. From my own State, I know we do 
not feel confident at all that we would be able to house the detainees 
in a safe fashion for the people of Kansas.
  I hope we can set aside the arbitrary timeline for withdrawing 
detainees from Guantanamo Bay and do the hard work of determining what 
status detainees should have, how military commissions work, how long 
we are willing to hold detainees, and whether they might ever be 
released to threaten Americans again. This is a tough problem. The Bush 
administration wrestled with this for years. When I was on the 
Judiciary Committee, we wrestled with the issue of how to handle the 
legal rights of detainees. We have a situation that we haven't seen 
before. This is one where we have detainees who are enemy combatants 
but don't represent a foreign country. They are freelancing or in an 
organized effort not based in a country. Normally, in the past, we 
would have a conflict with another nation, and we would hold prisoners 
of war until the conflict is over, and then there would be a military 
exchange or an exchange of prisoners at the end or there would be 
trials for these combatants so they didn't go back on the battlefield.
  We are still in the war on terrorism, despite efforts by the 
administration to rename it. Whether it takes place in Afghanistan, 
Iraq, and many other places; whether it is the Horn of Africa, where we 
are seeing problems, or Somalia, and in many other locations around the 
world, there is a dedicated terrorist force that doesn't represent a 
country which seeks to do us harm and kill American citizens and harm 
our interests. That continues to be the factual setting.
  When people are released from Guantanamo, we are seeing them back on 
the battlefield, and it is like they have received a promotion. In 
Afghanistan, one of the leaders of the Taliban effort was a person 
released from Guantanamo Bay. It is like this was a credentialing 
exercise. Now he is leading a broader group. We don't want that to take 
place. We don't want to release new commanders into the field.
  In normal history, this wouldn't be an issue until the war itself was 
resolved. We have to figure out the military commissions. We tried 
multiple times, in various ways, to be able to give legal rights to 
individuals without revealing confidential information that would hurt 
our troops on the battlefield. We haven't found the appropriate route 
yet. I stand ready to try to do that. But I don't stand here willing to 
release people who will harm U.S. citizens. I don't think that is in 
our interest, and that is not our job.

  I don't think it is our job to try to meet a European public's 
impression of a facility that our Attorney General believes is well 
run. It may have image issues that are taking place, but let's get 
actual facts. If the Europeans are that concerned about it, why don't 
they get more involved in Guantanamo Bay or be willing to take some 
detainees and not release them back onto the battlefield. I think this 
is one of the tough problems that needs to involve everybody. If there 
is an open debate and dialog--and the American people and interests 
should be our primary concern--we can resolve this but not by releasing 
detainees or putting them on U.S. soil, and certainly not by putting 
them at Fort Leavenworth, KS, where people are saying clearly that we 
cannot handle this. We are not prepared to do this.
  It will hurt the primary mission at Fort Leavenworth and the 
education of our students and also the foreign military officers as 
well. We have students from Jordan, Egypt, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia. 
These are students and army officers from those four countries. We get 
army officers from 90-some countries on a regular basis to Fort 
Leavenworth for training and for relationship building with U.S. 
military forces. When we go to joint exercises--and there is rarely one 
around the world that isn't a joint exercise--there is confidence and 
communication that is built up among the individuals. We have been told 
by these four countries--by students from these countries--if we move 
the detainees to Fort Leavenworth, KS, at the same place we are 
training future military leaders, they will pull their students out. We 
will defeat the purpose.
  We need to be able to work with the Pakistani military, the Saudi 
military, and the Jordanian and Egyptian militaries. Now we will lose 
those officers because we move detainees to Fort Leavenworth, a place 
we are not set up to handle them. It will cost hundreds of millions of 
dollars, even if we could put a facility there, and the people in the 
community will feel threatened. This is an urban setting. For what? Why 
are we doing this? So we can make ourselves less secure and make 
ourselves

[[Page S5463]]

less effective around the world? So that we can please the European 
public with this move? That is the reason.
  None of this makes any sense. We have invested $200 million in the 
Guantanamo Bay facility that is well run. I don't know why we would do 
this. It doesn't make any sense. I think we ought to work on this in a 
bipartisan fashion and roll up our sleeves and see what is in the best 
American interests. Treating detainees humanely, rightly under the 
international conventions we have agreed to with other countries, yes, 
but not harming U.S. citizens or subjecting our military to recycled 
individuals who have been captured and put at Guantanamo Bay and 
released, and where we can meet them on the battlefield again as 
organizers and as people held up as examples to the terrorist fight.
  We can do this but not with the direction that the administration is 
going in, and certainly not by excluding members of the other party.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kaufman). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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