Reid's Now OK With Detainees In U.S. Prisons

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May 26 2009, 3:58 pm by Marc Ambinder

Courtesy of the indispensable Jon Ralston, some nuance on the ultimate fate of the Guantanamo detainees today from Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), on the eve of his major fund raiser with the president. Reid taped a segment of Ralston's program, Face to Face:

Reid, who has been criticized for his contradictory positions on Guantanamo Bay, said some prisoners will be put in maximum security prisons on U.S. soil, emphasizing the safety of those facilities:

"A maximum security prison in the United States, there has never been a single escape."

JR: "You think eventually the plan is going to be to put them in maximum security prisons here in this country, correct?"

"I think some. Keep in mind, Jon, there's so many different issues. There's no question that a number of these people who are there are not guilty of anything. The Uighurs, these are a group of Muslim Chinese who are guilty of nothing. They were arrested, put in there. They are there. They are doing nothing. We're going to have to find someplace to put them. We can't send them back to China. Should they go into a maximum security prison? Probably not."

Comments (2)

Higgs Boson May 26, 2009 9:31 PM

Shucks. Reid reversed himself. Deprives me of my opportunity to question him as follows:

Fade in:

Reid: (paraphasing) We won't allow terrorists on our soil.

Me: How do you know they are terrorists?

Reid: Hems & haws... " uh..."

Me: They haven't had due process. How do you know they haven't just been picked up by the bounty hunters who roamed Iraq, picking up any old Joe Mohammed they could sell to the Americans.

Reid: More hems & haws.

Fade Out

otherone May 28, 2009 10:23 AM

I don't think the issue is so much that of escape as it is having these guys on US soil. If I'm a Jihadist and my guy has been sent to a supermax in, oh let's say, Florence, CO. I'd simply wander into the Safeway there and blow myself up during the busiest shopping period as a warning to those who are holding my guy there i.e.the local population). Think of the political chaos this would cause. Think there is a shortage of volunteers for That sort of assignment? I don't. We'd be giving them a target, with REAL propaganda value. Regular bad guys just don't have buddies who are willing to take the ultimate one for the team. Unfortunately these guys do.
details,niggling details..