Lindsey Graham: “To my good friend Senator Levin, we fundamentally disagree. There is a principle at stake here that is as old as war…”

“To my good friend Senator Levin, we fundamentally disagree. There is a principle at stake here that is as old as war itself. Writs of habeas corpus have never been given to enemy combatants or POWs. They have never been allowed access to the Federal court to challenge their enemy combatant status tribunal which is new and different, beyond the Geneva Conventions. The German prisoners were tried by a military commission. Four of them were executed. They were not allowed to go into Federal court under writ of habeas corpus because the Constitution does not confer the right of a writ to a foreign alien involved in combat activities against the United States. The only reason we are talking about this is, the Court is inviting us: As the Senate, do you want al-Qaida members, under 2241, to have the writ of habeas corpus. The military commissions are set up to try these people. My amendment talks about the procedure of keeping them off the battlefield, allows them due process rights beyond Geneva Conventions article 5, allows them now to go to a district court and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia beyond what the Geneva Conventions ever envisioned. The military commissions are totally different. No one has been tried yet. Here is the one thing I can tell you for sure as a military lawyer.…”