Patrick Leahy: “Monday we rushed to hold a hearing before the Judiciary committee on this important issue, and what happens? The…”

“Monday we rushed to hold a hearing before the Judiciary committee on this important issue, and what happens? The surrogate for the administration, former White House associate counsel Brad Berenson, who testified before us, defends the habeas corpus stripping provisions of this bill by arguing that the United States has been and still is suffering from an invasion that requires the suspension of habeas corpus. What are we doing? What is going on? That is outrageous. That is running scared. That is so wrong. Is he saying that for 5 years this administration has been allowing an ongoing invasion in the United States and we are not aware of it? Are we going to suspend the great writ on this basis? To quote Kenneth Starr: The United States is neither in a state of rebellion nor invasion. Consequently, it would [be] problematic for Congress to modify the constitutionally protected writ of habeas corpus under current events. I suppose the administration would say we are not modifying it. Heck, no, we are eliminating it. We are not modifying the writ of habeas corpus, we are knocking it out for all aliens. I agree with those from the right to the left, we should not modify, and we certainly should not eliminate, the great writ of habeas corpus.”