Legislation introduced by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) on Wednesday would permanently prevent Guantanamo Bay detainees from being transferred to the United States.
Blackburn and Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) co-sponsored the Providing Rigorous Oversight to Terminate Extreme Criminal Transfers Act (PROTECT Act) because current prohibitions on the transfer of detainees to U.S. facilities are tied to appropriations bills and must be reauthorized each year.
“One of President Obama’s first acts in office was signing an executive order to close Guantanamo Bay,” Blackburn said. “This past weekend an administration official said that Guantanamo detainees should be brought to the United States ‘for detention and trial and prosecution.’ My constituents elected me to uphold the Constitution, and I will not accept President Obama bringing terrorists to the United States to be read their Miranda rights.”
Blackburn said the recent release of five Taliban detainees from Guantanamo Bay in exchange for the release of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl was illegal and jeopardizes the lives of soldiers deployed abroad.
“Housing terrorists on American soil would put communities at risk and cost hard working taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars,” Blackburn said. “My bill will prevent Guantanamo detainees or any other foreign terrorists who take up arms against the United States from being transferred to American soil.”
The criminal penalty for violating the prohibition on detainee transfers would be up to five years in prison and a fine.
Wolf said Guantanamo Bay detainees are enemy combatants and bringing them to the United States would make them entitled to constitutional protections.
“It also brings a new risk for those who can’t be tried, opening a precedent for indefinite detention on U.S. soil,” Wolf said. “We already have two recent examples of how the administration’s policy of bringing terrorists to the U.S. for criminal prosecution has failed. First was Justice Department’s failure in 2010 to obtain convictions against an al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist implicated in the 1998 embassy bombings on all but one of 280 counts. Then late last year the Justice Department lost a case against a Somali pirate who is now seeking asylum to permanently live in the U.S. as a free man.”