U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

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69–011 2017

115th Congress, 1st Session – – – – – – – – – – – – – House Document 115–15 

THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION EFFORTS TO CLOSE 

THE GUANTANAMO BAY DETENTION FACILITY 

COMMUNICATION 

FROM

THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES 

TRANSMITTING

THE ADMINISTRATION’S DESCRIPTION OF ITS EFFORTS TO CLOSE 

THE GUANTANAMO BAY DETENTION FACILITY 

JANUARY 20, 2017.—Referred to the Committee on Armed Services and 

ordered to be printed 


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THE WHITE HOUSE, 

Washington, January 19, 2017. 

Hon. PAUL D. RYAN, 

Speaker of the House of Representatives, 

Washington, DC. 

DEAR MR. SPEAKER: For 15 years, the United States has detained 

hundreds of people at the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, a 

facility that never should have been opened in the first place. Rather than keeping us safer, the detention facility at Guantanamo undermines American national security. Terrorists use it for propaganda, its operations drain our military resources during a time of 

budget cuts, and it harms our partnerships with allies and countries whose cooperation we need against today’s evolving terrorist 

threat. By any measure, the costs of keeping it open far exceed the 

complications involved in closing it. 

As President, I have tried to close Guantanamo. When I inherited this challenge, it was widely recognized that the facility— 

which many around the world continue to condemn—needed to 

close. Unfortunately, what had previously been bipartisan support 

for closure suddenly became a partisan issue. Despite those politics, we have made progress. This Administration established a 

comprehensive, interagency review process to assess whether the 

transfer of a detainee is in the national security interest of the 

United States. Under this rigorous process, we have transferred 

196 detainees from Guantanamo with arrangements designed to 

keep them from engaging in acts that pose a threat to the United 

States and our allies. Of the nearly 800 detainees at one time held 

at the facility, today only 41 remain. 

The Department of Defense has also provided the Congress with 

a comprehensive plan to finally close Guantanamo once and for all. 

In addition to calling for us to continue to identify and effectuate 

secure transfer opportunities, it calls for the continued periodic review of the threat posed by individuals still detained, the use of all 

legal tools to deal with the remaining detainees still held under 

law of war detention, and the identification of a secure location in 

the United States to hold remaining detainees who are subject to 

military commissions or who we have determined must continue to 

be detained because they pose a continuing significant threat to the 

United States. I have included an update to that plan here. 

The restrictions imposed by the Congress that prevent us from 

imprisoning detainees—even to prosecute and secure a life sentence—in the United States make no sense. No person has ever escaped one of our super-max or military prisons here, ever. There 

is simply no justification beyond politics for the Congress’ insistence on keeping the facility open. Members of Congress who obstruct efforts to close the facility, given the stakes involved for our 

security, have abdicated their responsibility to the American peoVerDate Sep 11 2014 22:15 Jan 23, 2017 Jkt 069011 PO 00000 Frm 00003 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 E:\HR\OC\HD015.XXX HD015

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ple. They have placed politics above the ongoing costs to taxpayers, 

our relationships with our allies, and the threat posed to U.S. national security by leaving open a facility that governments around 

the world condemn and which hinders rather than helps our fight 

against terrorism. 

If this were easy, we would have closed Guantanamo years ago. 

But history will cast a harsh judgment on this aspect of our fight 

against terrorism and those of us who fail to bring it to a responsible end. Once again, I encourage the Congress to close the facility 

and permit more of our brave men and women in uniform serving 

at Guantanamo Bay to return to meeting the challenges of the 21st 

century around the globe. There remains bipartisan support for 

closing Guantanamo and we can do so in a responsible and secure 

way that also saves the American taxpayer money. Guantanamo is 

contrary to our values and undermines our standing in the world, 

and it is long past time to end this chapter in our history. 

Sincerely, 

BARACK OBAMA. 


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