Dem Leadership Moves to Kill Photo Amendment (Bumped)

Published June 5, 2009 11:08pm ET



THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned that Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic leadership is moving to strip the Lieberman-Graham amendment blocking the release of detainee photos from the supplemental appropriations bill now in conference. The Lieberman-Graham amendment, formally named the Detainee Photographic Records Protection Act, was passed unanimously in the Senate and provided President Obama “with the ability to block the publication of the photos that would endanger the safety of our men and women in uniform.” The amendment would allow the Secretary of Defense, in conjunction with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to certify that “that the disclosure of photographs like the ones at issue in the ACLU lawsuit would endanger the lives of our citizens or members of the Armed Forces or civilian employees of the United States government deployed abroad.” One senior staffer on Capitol Hill tells THE WEEKLY STANDARD that “the conference on the supplemental may drop the photo amendment to appease the House Democratic Caucus.” Indeed, as David Rogers reported in the Politico this morning:

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