Rebuffing Obama on Gitmo

Senate Democrats on Tuesday decided to strike $80 million from a spending bill that was going to fund the closure of the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay,  testing President Obama’s plan to shutter the controversial facility by next January.

The White House worked hard to downplay the setback, but several Democrats criticized the administration for putting their party in a quandary.

{mosads}Obama has yet to announce a plan on what to do with the detainees once the prison on Cuba closes, and many Democrats oppose having prisoners housed in their states. They did not want to vote for funds to close the prison without knowing where those prisoners would end up.

Under the circumstances, Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) said he had no choice but to strip from a supplemental war bill his own language providing $80 million to close the camp.

“No. 1, the administration still does not have a plan,” said Inouye. “So what is the money going to be spent for? And if that’s the case, why go through all the fuss, which is so unnecessary? They’re working on a plan and we should get one later this summer.”

Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who introduced Obama before his speech at the Democratic convention last summer, said the administration had put Senate Democrats in a tricky spot.

“We are vulnerable, because it’s difficult to defend a position if you don’t know what the position is,” said Durbin, who had implored the administration to develop a plan.

Durbin on Tuesday defended the idea of moving detainees to maximum-security prisons in the United States, but said removing the funds to close Guantánamo was the right decision.

He said Obama would “undoubtedly” have a plan on what to do with detainees in the coming months.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), however, told reporters he would not be all right with detainees being transferred to an American prison. “Not in the United States,” he said in response to a direct question at a press briefing on Tuesday.

Republicans had seized on the issue for weeks, and they crowed over a victory. By striking a united front in opposing the inclusion of funds to close Guantánamo without a plan on what to do with detainees, the GOP left divided Democrats without enough votes to approve the supplemental.

Asked if Republicans deserve credit for forcing Tuesday’s decision, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said simply, “Sure.”

Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, criticized Obama for not coming up with a comprehensive plan to handle detainees.

“The administration made a very serious error by announcing with great fanfare the closing of Guantánamo within a year without coming up with a comprehensive policy which has very tough issues associated with it,” said McCain, who supports closing the facility.

“Now they’re having difficulties. If the administration had come up with a comprehensive policy, it probably wouldn’t have evolved the way it did.”

{mosads}Republicans still plan to introduce amendments banning any transfer of detainees to the United States as the supplemental is debated on the Senate floor. That debate began on Tuesday.

The GOP arguments could find some support. Inouye’s original language fenced off money for closing Guantánamo until the administration presented a plan for dealing with the detainees. It also prohibited the money to be used to transport detainees to the United States.

The administration offered no criticism of the decision to strip funds from the supplemental, and White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters the timeline for closing Guantánamo remains “unchanged.” Gibbs said Obama will offer more details on his plan and address lawmakers’ concerns about relocating the detainees to the United States in a national security speech on Thursday.

The Office of Management and Budget issued a statement of administration policy supporting the Senate’s version of the bill that made no mention of the Guantánamo Bay issue.

At the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Robert Gates’s spokesman, Geoff Morrell, also told reporters that he sees “nothing to indicate that that date is at all in jeopardy.”

Inouye said the funding for shuttering Guantánamo would be dealt with in the regular fiscal 2010 appropriations bills.

But the administration has several other options to get the funds necessary to close Guantánamo once the president details his plans for detainees. The Pentagon could ask Congress to reprogram, or reallocate existing resources, possibly from military construction funds, to cover the costs of the closure.

Sam Youngman and Alexander Bolton contributed to this report.

 This article was updated at 12:05 a.m.