National Defense Authorization Act For Fiscal Year 2010
Floor Speech
NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2010 -- (Senate - July 23, 2009)
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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I wish to take a moment, in response to my good friends, Senator Graham and Senator Lieberman, and say a word on behalf of the U.S. Department of Justice and its prosecutors, who have been actively engaged in the war on terror for many years now and who have shown considerable success.
The information they have is that the number of individuals who have been successfully prosecuted, convicted, and incarcerated as a result of military commissions numbers in the handful--perhaps even fewer than five. By contrast, just since January 1 of this year, more than 30 individuals have been charged with terrorism, successfully prosecuted, and sentenced to Federal prison--more than 30 convicted or sentenced just this year. There are 355 inmates in Federal prison now who have been successfully charged, prosecuted, convicted, and are now serving lengthy sentences as a result of their history or connection with international or domestic terrorism.
I don't want to get into a discussion right now on whether military commissions are a good or bad idea, but what has proven tried-and-true in terms of actually putting terrorists behind bars, where they belong, has been the expertise and the experience and the capability of the U.S. Department of Justice. They have been successful. There are hundreds of terrorists behind bars. There are far more than have ever come through the military commissions during the course of this struggle. And I think we should bear that in mind as we speak about this issue and as we vote about this issue. There is a lot of high-quality prosecutorial work and a lot of patriotism in the Department of Justice, and there is a reason we should allow the professionals to sort out case by case which is the better venue for the trial, whether a military commission, however new and untested in this modern era, or the tried-and-true model of the U.S. Federal prosecutor.
I yield the floor.
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