How the Democrats Could React to Boumediene
Ilya Somin has an interesting take on how a Democratic Congress will deal with the Boumediene ruling:
Importantly, the Court does leave Congress a way out. If it wants to, Congress could still strip detainees of the protection they get under Boumediene by enacting a statute suspending the writ of habeas corpus under the Suspension Clause. With a Democratic Congress, I suspect that we might get a new detainee law that suspends the writ for certain categories of terror detainees, but also perhaps gives them more procedural rights than they got under the Republican-enacted MCA. For a variety of reasons, I doubt that the Democrats will be willing to take the risk of allowing the detainees to retain full habeas rights. If they don’t act and a terrorist released as a result of a habeas petition commits some atrocity, the Dems will take a predictable political hit. Especially if Obama wins the presidential election, expect the Democrats to enact some sort of partial suspension of habeas corpus, combined with new, but limited statutory procedural rights for detainees. At least that is my tentative prediction.
I think that would do something to ease my concerns. Whether it would pass muster with this Supreme Court majority is another thing. It behooves the Bush administration to work on this pronto.
“Boumediene, Executive Power, and Congressional Power”
