That number has dwindled over the years as the Pentagon has transferred lower-risk detainees to other countries – meaning that the prisoners who remain tend to be considered higher security risks.
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Lawmakers in the Republican-controlled Congress have blocked the most obvious path to closing the facility, banning the transfer of detainees to the United States.
Efforts to transfer prisoners overseas have been stymied by unrest in Yemen – a likely destination for many – and by recidivism among those already released. “We’ve seen many members of Congress express their opposition to considering the kinds of necessary steps to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay”. Today, 2000 troops and civilians are stationed at Guantanamo Bay to staff the prison and court alone, by one measure working out to $US4.4 million (more than $6 million) a year for each the last 91 detainees. The White House has said since July that it was finishing a plan to close the facility. Obama has argued that the detention center has outlived its usefulness and is just too expensive to maintain. Third, the administration will attempt to use “all legal tools” to handle the 10 detainees now in some stage of military commission process.
A guard tower at Guantanamo Bay.
“As Congress has imposed restrictions that now prevent the transfer of detainees to the United States, we recognize that this is going to be a challenge”, said Obama in his Tuesday address.
“Let us go ahead and close this chapter”, Obama said in White House remarks.
The White House says it will cost as much as $475 million to move them and renovate or build a new facility – but it will save $85 million a year in operating costs.
President Barack Obama has promised to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
On May 20, 2009, the United States Senate passed, by a 90-6 vote, an amendment to the Supplemental Appropriations Act that would block funds needed for the transfer or release of prisoners held at the detention camp. “And he doesn’t seem interested in continuing to try”. They say the plan doesn’t recommend a preferred site and the cost estimates are meant to provide a starting point for a conversation with Congress.
DONALD TRUMP: And we’re going to load it up with some bad dudes, believe me. “We’re going to load it up”.
“If, as a nation, we don’t deal with this now, when will we deal with it?”
“This makes no sense to me”, Sen.
That’s because two bills recently signed by Obama – the defense authorization and defense appropriations bills – contained provisions barring the transfer of Guantanamo detainees into the U.S. We urge that safe countries be found quickly for the 35 detainees who have been cleared for release. Ted Cruz said at a rally in Fernley, Nev. “These detainees can not come to American soil”.
“Further, should the President move detainees to the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, it could jeopardize the operations of the Command and General Staff College”.
GWEN IFILL: Presidential candidates also weighed in.
Cantu was in Rome and had no immediate comment on the Obama plan.
And he said if Congress would simply give “legitimate consideration” to the president’s plan, “that would make any sort of discussion about the president’s executive actions obsolete”.
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“I am very clear-eyed about the hurdles to finally closing Guantanamo”. That US prison is also TBD.
