President Barack Obama has ordered the federal government to purchase a vacant $140 million state prison in western Illinois and use it to house up to 100 enemy combatants – a.k.a. suspected terrorists currently detained at a military installation in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
That’s a little less than half of the 215 detainees still housed at “Gitmo,” meaning that other locations – including a U.S. Naval Brig in Charleston, S.C. – could still end up housing detainees from the government’s war on terrorism.
Terms of the deal were not released, and the U.S. Congress has yet to approve the funding necessary to transfer Gitmo detainees to U.S. soil.
The Thomson Correctional Center, located in Thomson, Illinois (150 miles west of Chicago), is a maximum security facility that was built in 2001. It has remained practically empty ever since, however – a monument to poor government planning.
The facility currently houses just 150 minimum security inmates, despite having 1,600 total cells and an additional 200 minimum security beds.
Needless to say, the feds are planning on spending big bucks to upgrade the prison, which will house federal inmates in addition to Department of Defense detainees.
Obama’s decision was praised by Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn and Sen. Dick Durbin, both democrats.
“Thomson Correctional Center – a high security prison – has been sitting empty for eight years,” Gov. Quinn and Sen. Durbin said in a statement. “The Obama Administration has put forward a plan to make it the safest prison in America and we are pleased that they have made this decision. This move will have a tremendously positive impact on the local economy — creating more than 3,000 jobs and injecting more than $1 billion into the local economy. This is an opportunity to dramatically reduce unemployment, create thousands of good-paying jobs and breathe new economic life into this part of downstate Illinois.”
Quinn and Durbin could face trouble selling that idea, however.
According to a poll conducted last weekend by Rasmussen Reports, 51% of Illinois voters opposed relocating some suspected terrorists from Gitmo to their state. Only 39% approved.
What do you think?
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By countryboy December 15, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Old Hussein is throwing a little pork back to the home boys I see. But wait, what do muslim politicians call BS expenditures since pork is taboo?
By Halftime December 15, 2009 at 3:48 pm
What’s another $140 million? That’s pocket change, heck, that’s pocket lint to this administration. Too bad we feel like we have to buy another prison and go thru the legal wranglings associated with moving them to the U.S. when they are currently housed in a perfectly good facility that is well-run by well-trained military personnel. What the heck, it’s only taxpayer money, right?
By Genomic Repairman December 15, 2009 at 4:28 pm
I agree with countryboy, I thought the prison system in Montana was gunning to get this. Hell if they escape in Montana all they can do is blow up a cow or fuck a fat chick. They have a giant prison available, the want the income and the local folks there support moving the terrorists.
By Liberty For Me December 15, 2009 at 5:14 pm
Just another government scam……
By Ben Famous December 15, 2009 at 5:44 pm
Finally I havent heard anything about this since Obama was first elected…
By land of the free December 15, 2009 at 9:17 pm
You’ve been watching too much Last House on the Left. Nobody is going to escape from any of these prisons. Only a very ignorant person would even think this would happen. Get a clue, people. These are federal prisons and no one is going anywhere unless and until their keepers release them through many checkpoints. If you support the war and don’t have any problem with the drones and ambitious pilots killing innocent people, then why are such brave Americans afraid of a bunch of sheepherders? Each prisoner is supposed to be able to receive a trial for the accusations they face. Have these people even had a trial?
You don’t mind killing them or having others kill them, but you don’t want to have them on your sacred soil even though the killing is all done at the behest of the Americans. Why do you think it’s okay for you to go around the world to kill anyone you don’t like but you won’t even be responsible enough to house those who are taken alive? It’s other inferior countries who should support these prisons? It would be interesting to see the reaction of people if South Carolina was going to get a lot of these prisoners. Would they be praising jobs or would they be afraid that these unconvicted sheepherders turned in years ago for a bounty who were in the wrong place at the wrong time would march up and down the street making trouble? If they escaped, which they won’t because that’s not even realistic, they would probably be a lot more concerned about getting away. They would never last among a civilian population that is not friendly toward them. Without a trial, it would be unknown if they are guilty of anything other than being a vagabond at the time the invasion in Afghanistan occurred. They could have been picked up during a security sweep and are guilty of being sheepherders or just being out at a time when a security detail picked them up. If you forget innocent until proven guilty, you’ve become what you claim to despise. Do you know anything about these people being guilty or not guilty? If so, you should be at the trial if they are ever given one. Once more: no…one…is…going…to…escape…from…a…federal…prison. Stop watching all these dumb movies that have no connection to reality. I’ve got to go now. I think I just saw a shadow and I just wet my pants worried that there might be prisoners on the hallowed mainland. What a radical concept!!
By No Way! December 15, 2009 at 9:22 pm
He’s way off on this one! Why bring them to the U.S.? They are still in prison just in the US. Even Amnesty International agrees that this is no real change.
By dj December 15, 2009 at 11:59 pm
So…um….it’s about jobs? So the Obama Administration is gonna move detainees from one jail, spend a butt load of money refurbishing another jail, all the while not really doing anything towards moving forward in deciding what they are gonna do with said detainees….to create jobs? Am I missing something here? Is this really happening? I get it…its a token reach around for Liberals, fine, but implying that it’s some kind of economic savior for Illinois as a reason to do this is ridiculous.
By ohara December 16, 2009 at 9:00 am
The Supreme Court already ruled that the US has to move on this.
SCOTUS ruled against the Bush administration in 2006 (Hamdan v. Rumsfeld) that President Bush overstepped his authority in ordering military war crimes trials for Guantanamo Bay detainees.
So that, boys & girls, means that GITMO is a NO-GO, a non-viable option. Why do you think that Bush repeatedly stated that he wanted to close Guantanamo?
SCOTUS also ruled in the 2006 Hamden case: “that Common Article 3 of Geneva applies as a matter of treaty obligation to the conflict against Al Qaeda. That is the HUGE part of the ruling. The commissions are the least of it. This basically resolves the debate about interrogation techniques, because Common Article 3 provides that detained persons “shall in all circumstances be treated humanely,” and that “[t]o this end,” certain specified acts “are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever”—including “cruel treatment and torture,” and “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment.”
The No waterboarding rule, no matter what John Yoo wrote or what Congress legislated, you can’t do it.
WHAT YOU SHOULD BE WATCHING is Kiyemba, et al., v. Obama, et al.(08-1234). The Supreme Court granted certiorari, meaning they agreed to hear the case. What happens with the administration’s plan on detainees could affect the outcome of the case & send it back to the lower courts.
“Issue: Whether a federal court exercising its habeas jurisdiction, as confirmed by Boumediene v. Bush has no power to order the release of prisoners held by the Executive for seven years, when the Executive detention is indefinite and without authorization in law, and release into the continental United States is the only possible effective remedy.”
The Obama administration has taken the same legal view as the Bush administration did on almost all GITMO cases & the ACLU is screaming that Holder is practicing the same tactics in delays as the previous administration.
This is a critical case because it requires the Supreme Court to “explain further (and maybe try to reconcile) two rulings they had issued on the same day in June 2008: Boumediene v. Bush, establishing a constitutional right for Guantanamo detainees to challenge their continued imprisonment, and Munaf v . Geren, limiting habeas rights for individuals held by the U.S. military but facing criminal charges in another country.”
The outcome of this is being directed not by the Bush or Obama administrations, but by the rulings of the Supreme Court, a conservative court. Even with the addition of Sotomayor, the court make up has not changed.
Source:
SCOTUSWiki: http://www.scotuswiki.com/index.php?title=Kiyemba_v._Obama
SCOTUSBlog: http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/
By Vacancy December 16, 2009 at 10:21 am
Would a stipend be available for private citizens who take them in? We have a son who still lives in our garage. We could put a couple in there with him.
THAT WOULD TEACH THEM.
By Halftime December 16, 2009 at 11:49 am
President Obama’s decision to transfer as many as 100 terror suspects from Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to a maximum security prison in rural Illinois potentially sets the stage for a new round of high-stakes legal battles over what additional rights, if any, Al Qaeda suspects are entitled to.
Illinois divided over news of incoming Guantanamo detainees Massachusetts town says yes to Guantánamo detainees Obama endorses military commissions for Guantánamo detainees Under their current terms of confinement at Guantánamo, detainees have a constitutional right to challenge the legality of their detention in federal court. But that’s it.
In contrast, from the moment the detainees set foot on US soil, their lawyers will have the ability to tap into the full array of constitutional and other legal protections enjoyed by every American citizen and resident.
How broad might those protections be?
[snip]
Congress passed a series of laws aimed at stripping Guantánamo detainees of potential legal rights, including the right to challenge the conditions of their confinement at the prison camp and to claim fundamental protections of due process.
But the US Supreme Court has issued a series of decisions establishing rights at Guantánamo, including a 2008 decision finding a constitutional right to challenge the legality of their confinement via habeas corpus petitions in federal court.
Once detainees are moved to the US, the tangle of congressional restrictions on detainee rights at Guantánamo will fall away.
Read the rest at: http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Justice/2009/1215/Guantanamo-detainees-on-US-soil-a-legal-minefield