Obama Faces Opposition to Closing Guantanamo

WASHINGTON – After seven years in office, President Barack Obama is trying to make good on his 2008 campaign promise to close the Guantanamo Bay Detention Center.

Obama says it puts America at risk, but critics say it helps with intelligence gathering. They also point out that many detainees Obama released have rejoined the jihad.

Shots of terrorists wearing trademark orange Gitmo jumpsuits are a staple in recruitment videos for jihadists, according to senior White House officials. They argue that closing the detention center will dry up propaganda that's putting America at risk.

With one year left in office, Obama's announcement to close Guantanamo got mixed reviews.

"This is about closing a chapter in our history," Obama said.

Of the 91 detainees at Guantanamo, 35 will soon be transferred to other countries. Ten are moving through the military commission process. The president wants to accelerate periodic reviews of those remaining to determine if they continue to pose a threat to the U.S.

After that, the White House estimates that 30 to 60 detainees will be left. The president wants them transferred to another facility in the U.S.

Obama's national security team identified 13 possible facilities, including existing federal prisons and military bases, but no specific recommendations have been made so far.

"I think a lot of the American public are worried about terrorism and in their mind the notion of having terrorists held in the United States rather than some distance place can be scary," Obama said.

But the president argues American courts have successfully handled high-profile terrorism cases, while American prisons are already housing dangerous terrorists.

"Terrorists like Richard Reid, the shoe bomber; Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who tried to blow up an airplane over Detroit; Faisal Shahzad, who put a car bomb in Times Square; to Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who bombed the Boston Marathon – they were all convicted in our Article III courts and are now behind bars, here in the United States," Obama said.

Congress is blocking the president from transferring any detainees inside the U.S. and while there is some bipartisan support, transferring Gitmo terrorists to America's backyard during an election year is a very tough sell.

Republican presidential candidates blasted the president's plan.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio tapped into the concern of many Americans – that under the president's proposal, terrorists captured in the future will lawyer up immediately before they can be interrogated.

"When I'm president, if we capture a terrorist alive they're not getting a court hearing in Manhattan; they're not going to get sent to Nevada; they're going to Guantanamo and we're going to find out everything they know," Rubio said.

Polls show the public strongly opposes closing Gitmo.

Republican Sen. John McCain has long supported closing down the detention center. He chairs the Senate committee that will consider the president's plan, but he's not impressed with it.

"What we received today is a vague menu of options, not a credible plan for closing Guantanamo, let alone a coherent policy to deal with future terrorist detainees," McCain said.

Critics pointed out that the president's announcement came just as a former Gitmo detainee was reportedly arrested in Spain for recruiting for ISIS.

The president is also catching criticism from groups like Amnesty International, which says instead of closing Guantanamo, he's simply changing its zip code.

White House officials say they see the plan as a starting point for discussion.