Posted on 06/15/2018 6:49:46 PM PDT by TBP
On Monday, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) proposed an amendment to this years National Defense Authorization Act. The National Defense Authorization Act has to be renewed every year, and every year Lee proposes the same amendment.
This year, it was co-sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (R-Calif.), who may be as far to the left of the political spectrum as Lee is to the right.
What was this amendment about? The proposal for Amendment 2366 read simply:
To clarify that an authorization to use military force, a declaration of war, or any similar authority does not authorize the detention without charge or trial of a citizen or lawful permanent resident of the United States.
In his speech on the Senate floor, Lee compared the current law to the laws that allowed for Japanese-American internment during World War II and the McCarran Internal Security Act (that President Harry S. Truman tried, unsuccessfully, to veto).
Lee was targeting a provision added to the National Defense Authorization Act in 2011 for fiscal year 2012, which allowed for American citizens to be arrested on American soil on suspicion of terrorism without a trial.
The purpose of the amendment is simple. Its to make sure that the U.S. government has no authority and claims no authority to indefinitely detain U.S. citizens apprehended on U.S. soil, Lee said in a statement to TheBlaze.
The laws of the United States and the principles that govern the behavior of decent people everywhere dictate that we should correct [this] error in the law, he continued.
Was it voted down? This amendment did not even make it to a vote.
On Wednesday, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) moved to table the amendment, which would postpone it from being voted on indefinitely. However, Inhofes motion was voted down 68-30, with senators from both parties voting to move forward.
While this did not guarantee that all 68 senators who voted to let the amendment go for a vote would have voted to pass it, it does mean that a veto-proof majority of them wanted to be able to vote on the issue.
But that vote did not mean that the amendment would move forward to a vote. On Thursday, a point of order was raised arguing that the amendment was not germane, or not relevant to the act to which it would have been attached. Because of this, the amendment could not move forward for a vote.
While the Senate, and the House of Representatives, will often try to attach unrelated issues to a larger bill, this amendment was addressing an existing issue already inside the National Defense Authorization Act. Because of this, it is difficult to tell why the amendment was ruled as not germane.
TheBlaze reached out to the offices of GOP Senate leadership members who voted against the bill for clarification. The offices of Sens. John Cornyn (R-Texas), John Thune (R-S.D.), and Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) have not yet responded. The office of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) referred TheBlaze to Lee.
Beyond shameful!
NDAA shouldn’t even be with us; doesn’t seem Constitutional to me.
Still, due process is a cornerstone of our legal system, is it not? It is one of the few things that separates us from every other country.
Attaching riders to a bill that it has nothing to do with is an evil deed.
The on going Maniforte case is how due process is corrupted.
Not unrelated, the turd in the punchbowl is how “unlawful enemy combatant” has been expunged from the lexicon.
It is the leftists who demanded even prior to 9/11/01 that those who clearly fall into that category be provided counsel and a trial. The uncomfortable fact, is even those who are citizens are clearly capable of causing mayhem.
Due process died, if you hadn’t noticed.
Really?...
FMCDH(BITS)
It wasn’t a rider. it dealt with an issue specifically covered by NDAA.
“...due process is a cornerstone of our legal system...It is one of the few things that separates us from every other country.”
Well spoken, sir. Look at Tommy Robinson in UK for an example of where it is not.
The new “Red Flag” laws are intended to deprive us of due process here in the U.S.
“Eternal vigilance is the price of Liberty”.
Ok, I wasn’t having some early onset demntia - whew!
Well, yes and no to the slogan, we are a country off laws. We are a country of lawyers elected to represent the people who pass laws delaying justice in order to enrich their fellow brethren in the legal profession at the expense of the public to whom they continually lie. Murderers caught with multiple dead kids buried in their yard spend eons on so called death row being defended, and cared for at tax payers expense.
Lindsey Graham is the lone Senator that blocked the amendment going forward.
Only McConnel can undo that. He can bypass the tradition that says amendments need 60 votes just to go forward after they have been approved by their committee. He can release the amendment himself if he choses. It is no different than how Harry Reid previously removed the same amendment from a final National Defense Autorization bill that the Senate had agreed would include the amendment (the amendment was approved in a vote of the whole Senate and then when the final bill was voted on, the amendment was not there).
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