Ayotte Troubled By AG Holder's Use of 2012 Election as Benchmark for Closing Gitmo

Press Release

U.S. Senator Kelly Ayotte (R-NH), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, today expressed dismay about recent comments made by Attorney General Eric Holder in which he pledged that the Administration would close the terrorist detention facility at Guantanamo Bay prior to the 2012 presidential election.

Holder's remarks, made Tuesday before the European Parliament in Belgium, came just a week after Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified that the recidivism rate for transferred Guantanamo detainees has risen to 27 percent - an all-time high. Appearing before the House and Senate Intelligence Committees during a hearing last Tuesday, DNI Clapper testified that of the 599 detainees who have been repatriated from Guantanamo, there are 161 either confirmed or suspected of reengaging in terrorist or insurgent activities - a rate of more than one in four.

"It's troubling that the Attorney General would talk about terrorist detention policy in the context of a campaign timeline. Politics should have nothing to do with how we detain terrorists and protect Americans," said Senator Ayotte.

She continued: "Increased recidivism rates among released Guantanamo detainees highlight a fundamentally broken terrorist detention policy that threatens our national security. Islamist extremists who want to kill innocent Americans aren't common criminals, and these terrorists should be detained in a secure location and tried in Guantanamo's state-of-the art courtroom, which is designed to safeguard classified information. I will continue to work with members of both parties to protect Americans by keeping Guantanamo open and preventing the use of any funds for the construction of facilities in the United States to hold Gitmo detainees."

Background:

Senator Ayotte visited Guantanamo Bay in March and believes it is a top-notch detention and court facility that addresses the special security concerns associated with trying terrorists and protecting classified information.

She has introduced bipartisan legislation, the Detaining Terrorists to Secure America Act (S. 982), that would establish Guantanamo Bay as the permanent location for detaining, interrogating, and trying terrorists; make permanent current limitations on the transfer of detainees to foreign countries; and permanently prohibit funding for the construction of terrorist detention facilities within the United States.

During a February 2011 Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Senator Ayotte asked former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates where he would detain high profile terrorist suspects. His answer was, "I think the honest answer to that question is we don't know."

In June 2011, Admiral William McRaven, Commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, testified at an Armed Services Committee hearing that a terrorist detention facility would be "very helpful," and admitted that the lack of a designated facility could, in some circumstances, lead to the release of detainees.

In June, Senator Ayotte successfully included a provision in the Senate version of the FY 2012 Defense Authorization bill that indefinitely prohibits the use of funds to construct or modify facilities in the U.S. to house detainees transferred from Guantanamo. The provision was approved by the full Senate Armed Services Committee.

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