Thom's blog - Wednesday December 22nd, 2010

You need to know this. President Obama is preparing to sign an executive order that will affirm the White House’s policy of indefinite detention for suspected terrorists. In other words – President Obama is following the same path as President Bush when it comes to throwing the legal rights of a suspected criminal out the window. 48 detainees at Guantanamo Bay have been selected for indefinite detention and will remain incarcerated with no charges brought against them for as long as the White House deems necessary. That number is likely to grow over the coming months. Detainees will have access to a lawyer – but instead of facing courts to challenge their detention – they will have to face a presidential panel that will determine the necessity of the prisoner’s detention over the legality of their detention. The White House did institute periodic review sessions every 6 months for each prisoner to determine whether or not detention is still necessary. But as National Security lawyer for the ACLU – Jameel Jaffer says – Obama’s policy will “normalize and institutionalize indefinite detention and other policies.” In our country. We all need to work to hold President Obama to his pledge to change this policy and to shut down Guantanamo.

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