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Reasons Why Gitmo Shouldn't Be Closed

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As President Barack Obama and Dick Cheney square off today on the pros and cons of closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center, there’s more news that suggests the president perhaps should go slow and steady on this one.

An unreleased Pentagon report has found that one in seven of the 534 Gitmo prisoners let go has returned to terrorism or militant activity, reports The New York Times. Two administration officials said the report was being held up by Defense Department employees who fear ending up on the White House’s bad side. Even some Democrats have now joined Republicans in voicing their concern over closing the camp in Cuba by January without an alternative plan for what to do with the remaining 240 prisoners.

Meanwhile, the idea of moving Gitmo detainees to the U.S. continues to be met with resistance. Sen. Dianne Feinstein this week suggested they be sent to the supermax federal prison in Florence, CO — home to such infamous characters as Ramzi Yousef, one of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers — but that idea was slapped down by the state’s two Democratic senators, Sens. Michael Bennet and Mark Udall, reports Politico.

"I strongly support the Senate’s decision to withhold funding for the transfer of the detainees until the Administration comes up with a plan for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility," said Bennet. "Because the detainees are being tried by military tribunals, they should be held in military facilities. Military detainees should not be transported to and held at supermax because it is not a military facility.”

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