President Obama tried to close the detention center in Guantanamo Bay during his first term but was unable to do so despite a Democratic- lead Senate. Obama refuses to give up on his campaign promise from 2008 and is once again attempting to close the controversial detention center.
Obama said the existence of the facility harms U.S. interests and that it needs to be closed according to the Washington Post.
"I'm going to go back at this," the president said. "I'm going to re-engage with Congress to try to make the case that this is not something that's in the best interests of the American people."
Guantanamo has come back into the news thanks to a hunger strike being undertaken by many of the prisoners. According to The New York Times 100 of the 166 prisoners at the facility were participating in the strike.
In order to prevent the detainees from dying forced feedings have been ordered by the military for 21 of the detainees.
"We will not allow a detainee to starve themselves to death, and we will continue to treat each person humanely," Lt. Col. Samuel House, the prison spokesman, said.
Obama approves of the forced feedings saying that "I don't want these individuals to die." Others believe that forced feeding is going too far.
Dr. Jeremy A. Lazarus, president of the American Medical Association, wrote to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel that any detainee who is mentally competent has the right to refuse to eat and that any doctor forcing a person to eat was violating "core ethical values of the medical profession."
"Every competent patient has the right to refuse medical intervention, including life sustaining interventions," Dr. Lazarus said.
President Obama believes that the best way to deal with the detainees in Guantanamo is to have them tried in the civilian court system, according to the Washington Post.
Closing Guantanamo will be an uphill battle for the president but if he is able to fulfill one of his earliest campaign promises it will be a huge victory for the administration.
© 2025 HNGN, All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.
