Guantanamo Prisoners May Be Illinois-Bound
Federal prison officials visited the Thomson Correctional Facility on Monday as Democrats, led by Sen. Dick Durbin and Gov. Pat Quinn, push a plan to house detainees from Guantanamo Bay there. Some Republican lawmakers say, however, the Chicago area would become a terrorist target if the plan went ahead.
Copyright © 2009 National Public Radio®. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.
MELISSA BLOCK, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Melissa Block.
ROBERT SIEGEL, host:
And I'm Robert Siegel.
The effort to find a home for Guantanamo Bay detainees is taking center stage today in a tiny town in northwestern Illinois. Federal and local officials visited the Thomson Correctional Facility, it's about 150 miles west of Chicago.
NPR's Cheryl Corley is in Thomson. Hi, Cheryl.
CHERYL CORLEY: Hi. How are you?
SIEGEL: Fine. I understand that there's an effort to get the federal government to consider buying or using the Thomson Correctional Center. Tell us more about the plan.
CORLEY: Well, the prison here is a large, sprawling entity. It was built about eight years ago as a maximum security prison, has 1,600 cells, but it's barely used. There's a minimum security section here and that's what the state has been using. It has about 200 beds. On average there are about 144 people here a day, prisoners here a day. And it's so unused, that's why officials here have really pushed for the federal government to take some action.
They're also pushing them to take action because this area has just been very hard hit economically. Unemployment is well over 10 percent. And the prison was supposed to be a boom for the community, but the state hasn't been able to afford to keep it open.
SIEGEL: Well, do residents of Thomson seem to welcome the prospect of possibly having the Guantanamo detainees there?
CORLEY: Well, it's really mixed, Robert. But for the most part I think so. I talked with a group of women who live around the area here and they say that this facility has just been gathering dust for several years and it's really time to put it to use. They're really not concerned with who is in the prison. They just want it to bring in jobs, which is estimated to be about 3,000, and really just to help this economy.
There are others here who are concerned about safety, though. And two others I talked to who believe that the state should be operating this facility and not the federal government. I talked to one resident who had been hired by the state to work here as a prison guard, but was reassigned to take another job at another prison about 100 miles away. And he's afraid that if the federal government actually takes over here, that state employees won't be able to return and get jobs here.
SIEGEL: Now, in Chicago some critics of this whole idea held a news conference. What is their concern?
CORLEY: Well, there are several critics mostly Republican congressmen and Republican officials who are running for office. And they're basically concerned about terrorism. They believe that Illinois, for example, with the country's tallest building now called the Willis Tower could be at risk. They're asking that the federal government conduct a study to see what harm could potentially come to that structure and to others.
And Congressman Don Manzullo, who represents this area, was actually up in Chicago. He was at the end of the tour that just finished here with a number of officials. He says it's just not worth having the federal government operate the facility with Guantanamo Bay detainees here.
Here's what he had to say.
Representative DON MANZULLO (Republican, Illinois): We cannot jeopardize the safety and security of the people in exchange of a promise for a job.
SIEGEL: As you said, Cheryl, Congressman Manzullo is a Republican. Democratic Illinois Senator Dick Durbin supports this plan. What did he say today?
CORLEY: Well, he said that it's really just time to move forward with this. That, you know, the state really needs these types of jobs. That this will be a very safe federal facility and it's time to move forward.
Senator DICK DURBIN (Democrat, Illinois): If we reach the point that our fear of retaliation stops us from prosecuting terrorists, incarcerating them, holding them accountable, then we will have lost our way as a nation.
SIEGEL: Senator Dick Durbin.
Cheryl, do we know when a decision might be made about whether the Guantanamo detainees will go to Thomson?
CORLEY: Well, right now the officials here are saying this is the first step in a process. They are also considering a couple of other sites in addition to the one here in Thomson.
SIEGEL: Okay, thank you. That's NPR's Cheryl Corley speaking to us from Thomson, Illinois.
Copyright ©2009 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.
Source: Illinois Prison Eyed For Gitmo Inmates
The Obama administration may buy a near-empty prison in rural northwestern Illinois to house detainees from Guantanamo Bay along with federal inmates, a White House official said Saturday.
The maximum-security Thomson Correctional Facility, about 150 miles west of Chicago, was one of several evaluated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and emerged as a leading option to house the detainees, the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because a decision has not been made.
President Barack Obama wants alleged terrorism suspects from the controversial military-run detention center in Cuba to be transferred to U.S. soil so they can be prosecuted for their suspected crimes.
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn has been hinting at a possible new use for Thomson, and he issued a statement saying he would hold a news conference Sunday to outline those plans.
Quinn's spokeswoman Marlena Jentz did not return a phone message from the AP Saturday.
Thomson was built by the state in 2001 with 1,600 cells, but budget problems prevented it from fully opening, and it now houses about 200 minimum-security inmates.
It is unclear how many Guantanamo detainees — many held without charges since the beginning of the war in Afghanistan — would be transferred to Illinois or when. Obama initially planned to close the Guantanamo Bay prison by Jan. 22, but the administration is no longer expected to meet that deadline.
If the Federal Bureau of Prisons buys the facility, it would be run primarily as a federal prison, but a portion would be leased to the Defense Department to house a limited number of Guantanamo detainees, the White House official said. Perimeter security at the site would be increased to surpass that at the nation's only Supermax prison, in Florence, Colo., the official said.
Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the Senate's second-highest-ranking Democrat, said in a statement Saturday he would support the plan. He said the prison would house fewer than 100 Guantanamo detainees and would have a "significant positive impact on the local economy" by generating more than 3,000 jobs.
Thomson Village President Jerry Hebeler said the move would generate desperately needed revenue for the town of about 500 residents near the Mississippi River.
"It's been sitting there for eight to nine years and our town is like a ghost town," Hebeler said of the prison, adding that a tavern recently closed and a planned housing development fell through. "Everybody moved or got different jobs."
Some lawmakers opposed the idea of terrorism suspects being brought to Illinois.
U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk, a Northbrook Republican running for Obama's old Senate seat, circulated a letter among elected officials asking them to write to Obama opposing the plan, saying bringing Guantanamo prisoners to the state would make it a target for terrorist attacks.
U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, whose district includes Thomson, said he adamantly opposed the proposal and that he has consistently joined with a majority of his colleagues "in fighting efforts to bring these terrorists onto our shores ... where they could one day be released into our communities."
Guantanamo Bay "is set up to house these dangerous terrorists, and they should stay there," said Manzullo, an Egan Republican who serves on the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade.
Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky, a Democrat, said Kirk and other Republicans were "pandering to irrational fears" and that closing the Guantanamo Bay facility would strengthen national security because al-Qaida used it as a recruiting tool.
Phone and e-mail messages left with Jim O'Connor, a spokesman for Illinois Sen. Roland Burris, were not immediately returned.
Thomson is not the only U.S. town that had hoped to lure Guantanamo detainees. Officials in Marion, Ill., Hardin, Mont., and Florence, Colo., also have said they would welcome the jobs that would be generated.
Comments
Discussions for this story are now closed. Please see the Community FAQ for more information.