John Shinkle/POLITICO POLITICO Pro GOP senators move to keep Gitmo open

Key Senate Republicans on Tuesday unveiled legislation that would effectively block President Barack Obama from fulfilling his pledge to close the U.S. military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, before he leaves office in two years.

The legislation from Sens. Kelly Ayotte, John McCain, Richard Burr and Lindsey Graham would prohibit for two years the transfer to the United States of detainees designated medium- or high-risk. It would also ban transfers to Yemen, where dozens of the 127 remaining Guantánamo detainees are from.


The bill is the Republican rebuttal to the Obama administration’s recent ramping up of Guantánamo detainee transfers — 21 have been sent to foreign countries since mid-November — in an effort to cut down the prison population and bolster the argument to shutter the prison. And it highlights the long odds Obama still faces to close Guantánamo in his final two years, particularly with Republicans controlling both chambers in Congress.

At a news conference on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, Ayotte argued the administration’s increased clip of transfers was dangerous because it could allow detainees to re-enter the terrorism fight, citing the recent terrorist attacks in Paris.

“It’s one thing to make a campaign promise,” she said, “but if you look at the security situation that we’re facing around the world right now, now is not the time to be emptying Guantánamo with no plan for how and where these individuals are going to go, no assurances of security of those who have been released.”

Graham called the bill a “timeout” on transfers that’s needed because of the terrorism threat that’s persisting across the globe.

Not all of the Republicans at Tuesday’s news conference have the same views on Guantánamo — and McCain, the new chairman of the Armed Services Committee, who has backed closing the prison, is seen as Obama’s best potential Republican ally on the issue.

Still, the Arizona senator slammed the administration for failing to present a plan to close Guantánamo and move the detainees who are too dangerous to be released, throwing his support behind the bill that would tie Obama’s hands on Guantánamo.

“This administration never presented to the Congress of the United States a concrete or coherent plan” on how to handle the detainee issue, McCain said.

Asked about Guantánamo on Tuesday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said it would be “very, very difficult” for Obama to close the prison before he leaves office without the help of Congress. But Earnest was unwilling to rule it out altogether. “I’m not ready to concede that yet,” he said.

The Republican bill, if signed into law, would certainly make Obama’s efforts to close the prison difficult, if not impossible. The measure would put a two-year moratorium on detainees who have been classified as medium- or high-risk by Joint Task Force Guantanamo. Ayotte said that covered the “vast majority” of remaining detainees, though exact numbers were not provided.

The measure would also tighten transfer restrictions on detainees who are cleared for release, rolling back language in the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act that made it easier for the Pentagon to certify detainee releases.

And it would extend the prohibition on U.S. transfers or construction of a U.S. facility to house Guantánamo prisoners for two years, a step that would likely be necessary to close the prison for detainees who cannot be released, such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Congress has imposed similar restrictions for years.

McCain said his Armed Services Committee would take up the bill, though he was not sure in what form. One possible avenue is this year’s defense authorization bill, which could make it more difficult for Obama to veto the Guantánamo measure as part of a larger, $500 billion-plus defense policy measure.