Political Quotes

“I rise to ask my colleagues to support amendment No. 1125, which will limit mandatory military custody to terrorists captured outside the United States. This amendment is cosponsored by Senators Leahy, Durbin, Udall, Kirk, Lee, Harkin and Webb. This is a very simple amendment. It adds only one word--the word ``abroad''--to section 1032 of the underlying bill. I strongly believe if it is not broke, do not fix it. The ability to have maximum flexibility in the United States is very important, and I totally support the Executive having that flexibility. This bill creates a presumption that members or parts of al-Qaida or associated forces will be held in the military system. That is what concerns me because the military system has not produced very well over the last 10 years. I want to take a moment to contrast some cases. On this chart, we have sentences--five of them from military commissions and five or six from Federal courts. The Federal courts have actually convicted over the last 10, 11 years not 300 people but 400 people. Military commissions are limited to some six convictions. Let's take a look at what they are. A very famous one is Salim Hamdan because he brought a Supreme Court case. He was bin Laden's driver. He was acquitted of conspiracy and only convicted of material support for terrorism. He received a 5-month sentence by the military commission and was sent back to his home in Yemen to serve the time before being released in January of 2009.…”