Bush Signs Terror Bill

“By allowing our intelligence professionals to continue this vital program, this bill will save American lives.”George W. Bush

“This nation is patient and decent and fair and we will never back down from the threats to our freedom,”George W. Bush

President Bush has signed the "Terror Bill" passed by Congress earlier this month. It is now LAW.

This law was designed to allow the US to bring to trial those captured and detained in the war against terror. These prisoners have been held in custody in Guantanamo Bay and other secret CIA locations around the world.

It also allows the CIA to resume certain types of:

"tough interrogation tactics while outlawing others"

This new law is the result of a Supreme Court ruling that special tribunals setup by the government to try terror suspects:

"violated U.S. and international laws and needed explicit authorization from Congress."

So President Bush went to Congress, they wrote this new bill and he signed it into law. Some of the provisions in this law include:

• Barring detainees from challenging their detention in courts (Habeas Corpus)


• Protecting prisoners from blatant abuses during questioning like rape torture and "cruel and inhuman treatment"


• Prisoners don't have to be granted a lawyer


• Hearsay will be allowed as long as the judge deems it reliable


• Evidence obtained through coercion is permitted

Some of the prisoners awaiting trial include:

• Omar Kahdr - Captured in Afghanistan, accused of murdering a US medic in 2002


• Khalid Sheikh Mohammed - Accused of the Sept. 11 mastermind


• Ramzi Binalshibh - An alleged would be 9/11 hijacker


• Abu Zubaydah - Accused of being Osama Ben Laden's link to many Al-Qaida cells


• 24 Other Detainees either at Guantanamo or secret CIA prisons around the world

Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) issued the following statement (full text here) regarding this new law:

“The legislation signed by the President today violates basic principles and values of our constitutional system of government. It allows the government to seize individuals on American soil and detain them indefinitely with no opportunity to challenge their detention in court.

There are many who are against this law:

Civil libertarians and leading Democrats decried the law as a violation of American values. The American Civil Liberties Union said it was "one of the worst civil liberties measures ever enacted in American history."

Many experts think that this law is headed right back to the Supreme Court on grounds that it violates the US Constitution.

Sources include AP Wire News, the Toronto Star, Russ Feingold