Adam Serwer reported yesterday on Eric Holder's testimony before a House Appropriations Subcommittee in defense of civilian trials over military commissions for 9/11 and other terror suspects.
Testifying before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice and Science, Attorney General Eric Holder faced a number of criticisms from House Republicans on the use of civilian courts to try suspected terrorists. In doing so, he addressed a number of myths underlying Republican criticism of using civilian courts instead of military commissions.
Ironically, Holder sounded least confident when defending the Obama administration's continued use of military commissions, noting that the commissions allow hearsay evidence but that "it doesn’t mean that you’re being unfair to the defendant; you’re simply looking at the particular forum that suits the particular facts of each case." Nothing says "legitimacy" like forum-shopping for where you'll get the best result.
Classified information: Holder noted (as Spencer Ackerman reported last week) that the procedures for handling classified information in military commissions are based on the Classified Information Procedures Act, or CIPA, which governs the disclosure of such information in federal court. "The system that is in place in the military commissions is actually based on CIPA," Holder noted.
Using trials as a platform: Holder noted that Aafia Siddiqui, who was recently tried in New York on terror-related charges, was removed from the courtroom after the first day because of her outbursts. "Article III Judges are used to dealing with people like this and know how to deal with them," Holder said, adding that judges in military commissions "don’t feel as comfortable clamping down on a defendant who’s trying to do that."
Civilian Trials for terrorists are a radical departure from Bush: Texas Rep. John Culberson asked Holder why one of the alleged Tanzania bombers, Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, was getting a civilian trial when he was a foreign national. Holder's response was to point out that the other conspirators had already been tried in civilian court, during the Bush administration.
Federal Courts mean terrorist defendants are being "coddled": Holder said this presumption got his "blood boiling," adding that "they have the same rights that a Charles Manson would have, any other mass murderer ... those are the comparisons people should be making, not to average citizens who have done no harm and committed no crimes."
That's an important development in this ongoing story, which has pitted Lindsey Graham and Rahm Emanuel against Holder in a purely political exercise, with Graham extending promises he can't keep on a "bipartisan" bill that would supposedly allow for Republicans to support closing Guantanamo. It's a bad deal, and one more Democrats need to be standing strong against. Thus far, Russ Feingold has been pretty much the sole Congressiona Democrat to take a strong stand on civilian trials, saying "The best way to bring these terrorists to justice swiftly is through our civilian courts."