SC Republicans vote to block Obama from releasing any more Guantanamo detainees | McClatchy Washington Bureau

South Carolina Republicans in the U.S. House voted to pass a bill banning all transfers of detainees out of the Guantanamo Bay prison on Thursday, in an effort to further hamper President Barack Obama’s plans to shutter the facility before he leaves office.

The House passed the bill on a 244 to 174 vote, but it’s unlikely to be approved by the Senate. Earlier this week, the White House threatened to veto the legislation.

The bill was co-sponsored by South Carolina Reps. Joe Wilson, Jeff Duncan and Mark Sanford. The Guantanamo debate became especially significant to Palmetto State lawmakers after the Pentagon scouted the U.S. Naval Consolidated Brig in Hanahan, S.C. as a potential site to transfer the detainees last year. The facility lies five miles from North Charleston, and Gov. Nikki Haley testified before a House Homeland Security subcommittee in April about the impact it could have on the state.

While the bill is unlikely to become a law, it was meant to send a message to the Obama administration.

“On legislative matters, the president has made it clear that he doesn’t know when no means no,” Sanford said after the vote. “It strikes me as reasonable to try to lay before the president once again that what he might be tempted to do in a lame duck is both unlawful and will cost lives.”

He said that while this bill is not new – there have been five similar laws – it was important for Congress to make its stance clear as the Obama administration enters a lame duck session. Once his actions “no longer have electoral consequence,” many worry about Obama using executive action to close the prison.

The bill, from Rep. Jackie Walorski, R-Ind., prohibits all transfers until Jan. 1 next year, or until this year’s annual defense policy bill is enacted, which for years has banned the transfer of Guantanamo prisoners to the United States.

“While the President is risking our national security to fulfill campaign promises, Congress will continue to put our national security first,” Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C. wrote in a Facebook post after the vote.

Closing the facility was one of Obama’s main campaign promises in 2008, but he has yet to acknowledged that he won’t be able to see it through with only a few months left in his second term.

“I am not ready to concede that it may still remain open because we’re still working diligently to continue to shrink the population,” he said last week, speaking at a summit in Laos.

The administration has worked to empty the prison as much as possible by moving detainees who have been cleared to foreign countries that accept them. Obama has shrunk the number of detainees from 241 to 61 during his time in office. In the most recent transfer, 15 prisoners were sent to the United Arab Emirates last month. It was the single largest release during the Obama administration, and increased the urgency for Republicans who want to prevent the shuttering of the prison.

“During the August recess, the administration released 15 dangerous detainees from Guantanamo Bay,” Wilson, an original co-sponsor of the bill, said in a House floor speech ahead of Thursday’s vote.

Wilson held up a printed out report to the chamber, citing a story by Reuters this week that two more freed Guantanamo detainees had re-joined militant groups.

“And he has plans to release more. The president’s reckless release of detainees in an effort to close Guantanamo puts American service members and families at risk,” he said.

Duncan introduced his own resolution earlier this year, which would authorize a lawsuit against the Obama administration if it attempts to transfer detainees at the Guantánamo Bay prison to the U.S. Earlier this week it gained its 50th cosponsor.

“No state should be a terrorist dumping ground,” Duncan said in a statement. “I know the people of South Carolina are vehemently opposed to this plan.”

There are 20 detainees currently held at Guantanamo who are eligible for transfer. Except for 12 members, House Democrats voted against the bill, including Rep. Jim Clyburn, the only Democrat in the South Carolina delegation.

The top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., argued that the rate of detainees released under Obama who return to the battlefield is less than six percent, while the group released under former President George W. Bush was between 20 and 30 percent.

“If in fact we can find secure places to transfer these 20, then it’s the right thing to do and the president ought to be allowed to do it,” he said on the House floor on Thursday. “Once we have determined that they are not a threat…and are transferrable, to say look, sorry, we’re just going to hold you because want to is really a violation of the U.S. constitution and the rule of law.”

Democrats have argued that while the most dangerous inmates should not be released, keeping the infamous prison open only serves as terrorist propoaganda.