President Bush signed a bill into law Tuesday that allows the U.S. to interrogate and try terrorists, pointing out three weeks before the midterm election that most Democrats opposed the measure.
“In memory of the victims of September the 11th, it is my honor to sign the Military Commissions Act of 2006 into law,” Bush said in an elaborate signing ceremony in the East Room.
In Congress, the bill was supported by 97 percent of Republicans and 19 percent of Democrats. Although Bush thanked these Democrats, he made a point of saying, “the majority of their party voted the other way.”
“Every member of Congress who voted for this bill has helped our nation rise to the task that history has given us,” the president said. “The Military Commissions Act of 2006 is one of the most important pieces of legislation in the war on terror.”
Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., derided the law as “seriously flawed” and “almost certainly unconstitutional.”
“The administration negotiated the final bill in secret with Republican leaders and rushed it through Congress in a blatant attempt to gain a partisan advantage before the Senate and House adjourned for the election,” he said. “It gives the president excessive power to label and detain enemy combatants.”
The new law allows the CIA to continue interrogating terrorists and the Pentagon to try detainees such as the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The legislation became necessary in June, when the Supreme Court ruled that the White House needed congressional authority to try detainees in military tribunals.
“And so I asked Congress for that authority, and they have provided it,” Bush said. “These military commissions will provide a fair trial, in which the accused are presumed innocent, have access to an attorney, and can hear all the evidence against them.”
Larry Cox, executive director of Amnesty International USA, said: “Now bad policyhas become bad law. The administration can now hold people indefinitely, without charge or without trial, with congressional authorization.”
Several Republican lawmakers, including Sen. John McCain, initially opposed the legislation as too tough on suspected terrorists, but eventually relented after negotiations with the White House.
“Debate over this bill has been heated, and the questions raised can seem complex,” Bush said. “Yet, with the distance of history, the questions will be narrowed and few: Did this generation of Americans take the threat seriously? And did we do what it takes to defeat that threat?”
