On the recordNovember 17, 2011
I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by the Senator from Colorado to strike the detainee provisions from the defense authorization markup--provisions that were agreed upon on an overwhelming bipartisan basis in the Armed Services Committee. I would like to start first by revisiting the history of this and where we are because the reason the Armed Services Committee, in the first place, thought it was very important we discuss this issue in committee and address it is that having participated in hearings over the course of months and months in the Armed Services Committee, there has been witness after witness from our Defense Department who has come in and our military leaders with whom we have been talking about the detention policy and asking them very important questions about where we are and how we are going to ensure that our military and intelligence community has the tools they need to protect America, and also asking them about this issue of detainees and how we are treating them. Because one of the important facts my esteemed colleague from Georgia, as well as the ranking member, Senator McCain, mentioned, is that we have a recidivism rate of 27 percent from Guantanamo--those who have reengaged our soldiers again and are back in theater. I was very concerned about this in the Armed Services Committee. That caused, over a series of months, us to ask about the administration's detainee policy.…
