U.S. Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., introduced a bill Tuesday to prohibit prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention facility from being transferred to federal prisons or military bases in Arizona.
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“The legislation I introduced today would prohibit the use of federal funds for relocating Gitmo detainees to the state of Arizona,” Franks said in a statement. “Out of 70,000 Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters that have been captured on the battlefield, one-tenth of 1 percent, less than 800, were actually deemed such a significant threat, or possessing such highly valued intelligence, that they had to be detained to prevent them from causing or facilitating further harm to innocent civilians as well as our troops in the field. Out of these 800, only approximately 250 detainees remain incarcerated at Guantanamo.”
Franks represents Glendale, Peoria, Sun City and Kingman and supports continuing Guantanamo’s operation and opposes a shift of prisoners into the criminal justice system.
Congressman Franks and his other esteemed colleagues participating in “not-in-my-backyard”-ing realize that these illegally detained individuals are going to have to go somewhere, right. We will never be able to convince other countries to take some of them if the US won’t.