Baier uncritically reported Bush administration's baseless contention that critics of detainee bill are "just flat wrong"
SUMMARY: During a report on the Military Commissions Act of 2006, Fox News' Bret Baier uncritically reported the Bush administration's assertion that, under the bill, noncitizen detainees have a right to challenge their detention and designation as "unlawful enemy combatant[s]" and that critics of the bill who say otherwise are "just flat wrong." In fact, a detainee's ability to challenge his or her detention effectively depends on the government's willingness to provide an initial hearing, which the government can postpone indefinitely.
During the October 18 edition of Fox News' Special Report with Brit Hume, Fox News chief White House correspondent Bret Baier uncritically reported the Bush administration's assertion that, under the Military Commissions Act of 2006, noncitizen detainees have a right to challenge their detention and designation as "unlawful enemy combatant[s]" and that critics of the bill who say otherwise are "just flat wrong." But as Media Matters for America has explained, the measure allows a noncitizen who the government claims is an "unlawful enemy combatant" to challenge his or her detention only once the detainee has appeared before a review tribunal -- but the law does not impose a time limit on how long the government can delay bringing a detainee before that tribunal. The effect of the legislation, contrary to the Bush administration's claims, is to allow the president to detain any noncitizen within the United States or outside its borders for any reason, indefinitely. It is not the critics pointing this out who are "just flat wrong."
Baier's report opened with statements from Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Jennifer Daskal, U.S. advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, condemning the law. Daskal explained that, under the legislation, "detainees who are locked up by the government cannot get to court to challenge the legality of their detention even if they're innocent, even if the government made a mistake."
But in his report, billed by host and Fox News Washington managing editor Brit Hume as explaining what "the bill actually do[es]," Baier repeated, unchallenged, the assertion by "senior administration officials" that critics like Daskal and Leahy "are just flat wrong," based on the text of the bill. Baier then described the review process:
BAIER: But senior administration officials say these statements are just flat wrong. They say it's all laid out in the 38 pages of the new law.
A detainee first goes through a process to determine his or her status. A U.S. military panel, called a Combatant Status Review Tribunal [CSRT], determines if the detainee is a, quote, "unlawful enemy combatant." The detainee has the right to challenge that status determination in federal court, specifically the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, considered the second most powerful court in the country. If the Court of Appeals upholds the tribunal's judgment, the detainee has the right to petition the most powerful court, the U.S. Supreme Court, to address the issue there.
Baier also reported the assertion by former George H.W. Bush and Reagan administration attorney David Rivkin Jr. that, contrary to the critics' claims, detainees can challenge their detention:
BAIER: He [Rivkin] points out, while detainees do not have the full judicial rights U.S. citizens have to challenge detention in U.S. courts, known as habeas corpus, under this law, contrary to the public statements of administration critics, detainees can challenge their detention.
RIVKIN: The way it works is, if you're properly classified as an enemy combatant, then your detention is appropriate. If you're not an enemy combatant, and obviously your detention is not appropriate, you should be released.
However, Baier's description of the challenge "process" and Rivkin's subsequent claim that "under this law ... detainees can challenge their detention" assume that the government will promptly provide a detainee with a hearing for a determination of whether a detainee is or isn't "properly classified" as an enemy combatant. But as Media Matters has noted, the law does not set a deadline for the government to provide a detainee with a hearing. This means that under the new law, the "process" that Baier described -- one that allows eventual limited review by a federal civilian court -- effectively begins at the government's discretion.
At the same time, the law specifically bars noncitizens awaiting a CSRT determination from directly challenging their detention in federal civilian court by asking for a writ of habeas corpus:
No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.
So under the measure, when the government arrests any noncitizen based on the unreviewed assertion that he or she is an "unlawful enemy combatant," that person's ability to challenge the detention effectively depends entirely on the government's willingness to provide a hearing, which the government can postpone indefinitely. Effectively, the law grants the president the authority to detain any noncitizen within the United States or outside its borders, for any reason, for as long as the campaign against terrorism continues.
From the October 18 edition of Fox News' Special Report with Brit Hume:
HUME: That bill the president signed yesterday dealing with the treatment and trial of detainees is now the law of the land, but it remains a subject of intense controversy. So, what are critics saying the bill does, and what does the bill actually do?
Chief White House correspondent Bret Baier reports.
[begin video clip]
BAIER (voiceover): Even after the president signed the Military Commissions Act into law Tuesday, it was still stirring controversy. Critics have said for months the system the law sets up is unfair and unconstitutional.
LEAHY: It would perpetuate the indefinite detention of hundreds of individuals against whom the government has brought no charges and presented no evidence, without any recourse to justice whatsoever.
BAIER: This line of criticism continued even after the bill was signed into law.
DASKAL: What this means is that detainees who are locked up by the government cannot get to court to challenge the legality of their detention even if they're innocent, even if the government made a mistake.
BAIER: But senior administration officials say these statements are just flat wrong. They say it's all laid out in the 38 pages of the new law.
A detainee first goes through a process to determine his or her status. A U.S. military panel, called a Combatant Status Review Tribunal, determines if the detainee is a, quote, "unlawful enemy combatant." The detainee has the right to challenge that status determination in federal court, specifically the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, considered the second most powerful court in the country. If the Court of Appeals upholds the tribunal's judgment, the detainee has the right to petition the most powerful court, the U.S. Supreme Court, to address the issue there.
David Rivkin worked in the Reagan and first Bush administrations. He is now a United Nations human rights expert who has written extensively about the Military Commissions Act.
He points out while detainees do not have the full judicial rights U.S. citizens have to challenge detention in U.S. courts, known as habeas corpus, under this law, contrary to the public statements of administration critics, detainees can challenge their detention.
RIVKIN: The way it works is if you're properly classified as an enemy combatant, then your detention is appropriate. If you're not an enemy combatant, and obviously your detention is not appropriate, you should be released.
BAIER: But the appeals don't stop there. If a detainee is tried in a military commission and is found guilty, the entire commission record is first reviewed by the convening authority. Then the detainee has the right to appeal the commission's verdict in front of a three-judge panel sitting on a court of military commission review. If that panel upholds the conviction, the detainee has the right to appeal to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. And if that court also upholds the commission's verdict, the detainee can petition to be heard at the U.S. Supreme Court.
RIVKIN: There's more due process and more involvement by the civilian courts than in any other situation in human history involving enemy combatants and, actually, in some ways, more than you would get as a U.S. serviceman who had been put for courts-martial, because you do have a shot at the Court of Appeals.
[end video clip]
BAIER: Detainee appeals built in to what White House officials now call a misunderstood and mischaracterized law. Brit.
HUME: Bret, so what's the view there of what will happen to this measure? Because you hear that it's going to be quickly challenged -- indeed, it may already be challenged in the court -- and will end up before the U.S. Supreme Court?
BAIER: Well, Brit, there's a confidence here. Senior White House officials say they expect it to be challenged in court, but they believe that if it ends up back at the U.S. Supreme Court, that the U.S. Supreme Court justices laid out all of their stipulations in the majority opinion back in June, essentially saying if Congress weighs in on this and lays out the guidelines and structure for these military commissions, that they are OK with them moving forward. They believe then it will be constitutional and will be upheld by the Supreme Court.
HUME: Bret, thank you.
This is literally the only law that Bush has not added one of his infamous signing statements. THAT should be the biggest red flag to anyone out there.
At this point, why should anyone trust anything these creeps say or do? Why? So, you're held indefinitely until 'they' say you are 'allowed' to have a manufactured hearing... then, back to the hole... forever. How does this help us win the 'war on terror'? Anyone?
...perhaps, 'the only one' is an over-exageration... But, it is one of the few (maybe it is the only). I, frankly, am very scared.
[link to www.boston.com]
This is a nice link...
[link to www.presidency.ucsb.edu]
Let's not fool ourselves to think this is just another excess, or a wacky Republican shenanigan, or the like.
We surrendered to the terrorist, to the Neo-Con's desire to rule without restraint, to single out a whole group of dissenters if need be to consolidate absolute power, and make them enemies of the state, and focus fears, and energies not on the restoration of democracy, but on our short term unsubstantiated fears, one after the other until we will have only our government left to fear.
This is only 60 years removed from the last time this happened to a major democracy, and a World War had to be won, a Cold War had to be finally won before we could reclaim our freedoms. It took only a few short decades and we have begun to slide down the same deadly, sickening path.
We knew it would happen or at least be tried, with a free enterprise seen as some how able to facilitate better alternatives to government, and corporations seeing themselves legally the same as citizens, we have forsaken the individuals rights by the same people whom screamed the loudest about protecting the same, Republicans.
Freedom has come at the highest cost, and must be a continuous diligence from the free to maintain them. When freedoms are taken for granted, then they are easily taken away by those who would believe themselves empowered to take them for their own ambitions.
We the nation that introduced real democracy to the world should be the last to forget such lessons as we spent the highest price to keep our rights in blood, and treasure.
Happy Thoughts;
Dan Grady
An additional problem is what is to stop the government(the prosecution) from intentionally or inadvertently classifying a U.S. citizen as an alien 'unlawful enemy combatant' That citizen would have no right to petition the federal courts for relief challenging their classification(noncitizen)but would have to wait a CSRT status determination which the government can postpone indefinitely. Thus this law is could be invoked against U.S. nationals.
I used to think that we had learned our lessons from history that practices such as the internment of Japanese-Americans and the prosecution of dissents during the 'Palmer Raids' (under the wartime espisonage acts ) diminished us as a free society
...that this 'law' will be abused against anyone who disagrees vehemently with the Bush admin. Hell, I could be labeled an 'enemy combatant' just for frequenting this site.
Hard-liners and apologists will call that assertion 'absurd' or 'loony'... Again, what have these creeps done to gain our trust (at all)? Scary indeed.
"Hard-liners and apologists will call that assertion 'absurd' or 'loony'... "
What the apologists can't address is that it's the possibility that's unacceptable, besides any prediction of actual occurance. It's very easy to say "We won't abuse it", but that's a matter of faith. The whole reason we have a system is to prevent the very possibility of such things, not to put us in a situation where we have to trust the government to behave admirably. We could have a law that states that police could enter your house and confiscate any firearms if they felt you were going to use them to commit a crime, without any evidence. Would right-wingers say "it's absurd to think the police would abuse that", or would they be screaming from the rooftops about the very possibility of it?
The Founding Fathers formed our government on the concept that you can't trust the government, since we had broken ourselves free of Imperialist England. We didn't like dealing with a King, which is precisely why we have separation of powers and checks and balances. If someone is acting inappropriately, then others correct the situation. "Trust" was never part of the equation, obviously.
The way Bush apologists talk, they would be perfectly happy having him as a king with unlimited power. After all, they seem to know he would never abuse his powers, right? So why not?
When you say
..that this 'law' will be abused against anyone who disagrees vehemently with the Bush admin. Hell, I could be labeled an 'enemy combatant' just for frequenting this site.
I believe that is the Bush and Company objective.
Hard-liners and apologists will call that assertion 'absurd' or 'loony'... Again, what have these creeps done to gain our trust (at all)? Scary indeed. They have done NOTHING to gain my trust. These are people that are trying to take away my rights.
No one is taking away your rights J.
Bush is not stopping you from posting anti Bush propaganda on MMFA.
You still owe Bill O'Reilly an apology for a calling him a domestic terrorist yet apologizing the blatant terrorist activity of KKK Robert Byrd.
You are one dopey person aren't you?
Sure just act like a child and not stick to the topic.
An appology was on topic HOW?
You are also stupid!!!!!
Bush-bashing... I love that! Aaaawww.
Im not even going to respond to you.
Obviously you do want to attack.
You are the queen of attack.
Still waiting on the apology to Bill O'Reilly for calling him a domestic terrorist.
Bill is a domestic terrorist. He encouraged Al Qaeda to blow up a major American city. No apology needed.
Come on... Yeah... poor Bill.
For saying she hates America? Or is it only those with residence on Planet Wingnut like YOU that gets to use the over the top rhetoric?
This unconstitutional and illegal "law" just removed our 4th, 5th, 6th, and 8th Amendment rights.
Bush supporters will dismiss as 'abusrd' and 'ridiculous' our concerns about these laws. Of course, the fact that Bush distorted and mischaracterized to get the law in the first place is irrelevant. The fact that he isn't leveling about the content of the law should not be considered a red flag. We just need to trust him and his judgment (all evidence to the contrary during the past six years notwithstanding). Certainly we can trust Gonazeles, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Bush to do the right thing.
For saying she hates America. While you are at it you ought to appologize to MMFA for subjecting us to your inanity
Should have ended up under blazinglydumbs post not yours. I dont know how it ended up here.
Habeas Corpus was the way that defendents forced the body holding them to prove they had the right to hold them.
There is nothing protecting the defendent's right to force a hearing now.
HC was the way to disallow the government to hold you without proving there might be a need to hold you. Without that, there is no guarantee that they will never hold that first hearing.
Well, luckily, the next President will almost certainly reject this law. If we're lucky, the next Congress will reverse it.
... any time to get the ball rolling:
[link to www.dailykos.com]
[link to www.washingtonpost.com]
You should read this article (but only if you want to scream!) to see how even Arlen Specter says that this new law is wrong, and removes the right of US residents to challenge their detentions.
Funny how the fact that we want the US Constitution to be honored makes us unpatriotic. Only in mirror-world, where everything is reversed, could that be true.
"if you're properly classified as an enemy combatant, then your detention is appropriate." sounds like something any two bit dictator [like bush] would say. and who decides if you are properly classified. that would be the same people who already made up their minds.
Its like saying IF Bush is guilty of treason he can legitimatly be hung.