[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 17 (Thursday, January 26, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S107-S108]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             GUANTANAMO BAY

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, on an entirely different matter, some 
things in life are just constants: The Sun rises in the east, water is 
wet, and Democratic administrations look for ways to let terrorists out 
of Guantanamo Bay.
  The Biden administration has already overseen the largest terrorist 
jailbreak in modern memory when they abandoned the Bagram Air Base 
prison in Afghanistan. They let the Taliban waltz in and free thousands 
of terrorists, reportedly including the ISIS-K suicide bomber who 
killed our 13 American servicemembers in Kabul during the Biden 
administration's botched withdrawal.
  Now, rumor has it they are considering writing a sequel to that 
jailbreak by continuing the Obama-Biden administration's literal 
obsession with removing terrorists from our secure and

[[Page S108]]

legal detention facility at Guantanamo.
  Let's get a few things straight. The American people are safer and 
more secure because monsters like Khalid Shaikh Mohammed are off the 
battlefield and behind bars where they belong. When the Obama 
administration wanted to bring these terrorists to America, introduce 
them into the American judicial and prison systems, the Congress, on an 
overwhelming, overwhelming bipartisan basis, said no. But the 
progressive leftists in the Biden administration don't seem to care. 
They seem more concerned about the views of European human rights 
activists than about key national security concerns and complex legal 
questions.
  So new reports suggest that President Biden and his team are trying 
to cut plea deals with these terrorists and war criminals. They want to 
cut these guys deals.
  What would the deals look like? No one knows. They won't tell 
anybody. Would they be transferred into our own taxpayer-funded justice 
system for American citizens? Are we going to have hardened terrorists 
moving through the streets of Manhattan, with terrorist lawyers getting 
the rights and access that pertain to defense counsel?

  Mayor Adams is already saying New York can't cope with President 
Biden's open southern border, and now the NYPD could have to babysit 
terrorists as well? Or is the plan military commissions, in which case, 
what concessions is the President planning to make to these murderers 
to get their activist lawyers to accept that forum?
  Or does the administration intend to follow the Obama 
administration's model and rely on third parties and other countries to 
do the dirty work of detention? Well, of course, if you are going to 
send these people to other countries, that requires allies who are 
reliable, responsible, and actually willing to take these terrorists. 
Does President Biden plan to gamble on an Iraqi Government that is 
increasingly under the influence of Iran? Or do they want to double 
down on detention facilities run by Syrian Kurdish partners in areas 
that are not yet under the control of the Assad regime?
  There is already no plan for Europe to reabsorb their citizens who 
fought for ISIS and are currently detained by the SDF. We are going to 
add to those ranks?
  There is a huge long list of practical problems the administration 
needs to consider before they toy with risky plans to shutter a 
perfectly good facility at Guantanamo Bay for no good reason. The Biden 
administration has got to rediscover some common sense.
  Now, I understand that liberal activists are willing to leave 
innocent American families in greater danger in exchange for a little 
bit of leftwing symbolism, but our Commander in Chief has a higher 
duty.

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