Reject Endless Was and Torture Cover-Up !
After years of litigation, the Supreme Court recently ruled in Boumediene v. Bush that detainees held at Guantánamo have a right to challenge their detention through habeas corpus -- the ancient freedom that protects people from being thrown in prison illegally, with no help, no end in sight and no due process.
Habeas proceedings could allow detainees to bring up the fact that the evidence that the government has against them came from hearsay, or even torture and abuse. Courts could also release people who are detained indefinitely without charge. Attorney General Michael Mukasey wants to make sure neither of these things happen.
That’s why he’s calling on Congress to authorize indefinite detention through a new declaration of armed conflict. He is also proposing that Congress subvert the right of habeas corpus with a new scheme to hide the Bush administration’s past wrongdoing -- an action that would undermine the constitutional guarantee of due process and conceal systemic torture and abuse of detainees.
Tell Congress to demand the truth on torture and abuse and reject the Bush system of injustice!
Mukasey is asking Congress to expand and extend the war on terror forever. Anyone whom this president or the next one declares to be an "enemy combatant" could then be held indefinitely without a trial. And, the attorney general’s proposal would hide the torture and abuse conducted since 9/11.
At the same time that the House Judiciary Committee is investigating whether high-level Bush White House officials may have committed torture and abuse crimes, Mukasey should know better than to ask Congress to give him the power to detain people without a trial and hide torture and abuse from the courts.
Tell Congress to reject the dangerous Bush/Mukasey plan.