Say Anything Blog

Excellent.

WASHINGTON - The Senate voted Thursday to bar foreign terror suspects at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from filing lawsuits in American courts to challenge their detentions, despite a Supreme Court ruling last year that granted such access.

In a 49-42 vote, senators added the provision by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., to a sweeping defense policy bill.

Under the provision, Guantanamo Bay detainees would be allowed to appeal their status as an "enemy combatant" one time, to the Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. But they would not be able to file petitions known as writs of habeas corpus, which are used to fight unlawful detentions, in that or any other U.S. court.

"For 200 years, ladies and gentlemen, in the law of armed conflict, no nation has given an enemy combatant, a terrorist, an al-Qaida member the ability to go into every federal court in this United States and sue the people that are fighting the war for us," Graham told his colleagues.

Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., said the provision was a major mistake and deserved scrutiny. "It's contrary to the way the court decisions have come down already. It is an extraordinary step for this Congress to be taking," he said.

Sen. Bingaman needs a civics lesson. In America, the people's representatives write the law, not the un-elected appointees to the Supreme Court.

Some will say that this law violates the Constitution. I'd respond by asking when the Constitution was ever supposed to provide rights to enemy combatants.