Obama Administration Considers Moving Detainees to Michigan, Kansas

A proposal being considered by the Obama administration could move detainees from Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to a prison in the United States with its own courtrooms for military and civilian trials.

U.S. government officials say a hybrid military-civilian prison is one option the administration is looking at as part of President Barack Obama's plan to shut down the Guantánamo Bay prison by January.

U.S. security agencies are eying a military prison at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas and a maximum-security prison in Standish, Mich., as possible sites.

The controversial plan will most likely fuel strong debate.

"We don't want them here," Sen. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican, said at a news conference this morning. "They should be treated with dignity and humanely, but it shouldn't be here."

Brownback argued that the facility in Cuba should remain open.

This year, under a war-funding bill, Congress also blocked the Obama administration's request for $80 million to close the Guantánamo Bay prison, which houses about 229 detainees.

Among the administration's concerns is where to send the nearly 60 prisoners who have been cleared for release but cannot return to their homelands because of fears of persecution. The U.S. government has been trying to persuade European allies to open their doors to these former detainees and grant them asylum.

The departments of Defense, Justice, and Homeland Security would run the maximum-security facility, but officials emphasized that no decisions have been made.