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Washington (CNN)President Barack Obama on Tuesday called for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility after delivering his plan to Congress to achieve a goal that has long eluded his presidency. The blueprint comes seven years after Obama made an Oval Office vow to permanently shutter the prison for enemy combatants, but it already faces objections from Republicans and legal obstacles they have placed to transferring Guantanamo detainees to U.S. prisons. Obama nonetheless said emptying the prison would move the country past what he described as a troubled era of wartime behavior. "The plan we're putting forward today isn't...

President Obama detailed Tuesday a four-point plan he'll submit to Congress to eventually close the detention facility at Guantanamo, Cuba -- a plan that includes releasing more of the remaining 91 detainees, while transferring others to an as-yet determined facility on U.S. soil.

The White House has revealed its plans for closing the controversial Guantanamo Bay detention facility, one of the president's long-standing goals. The Pentagon has proposed transferring the remaining 91 detainees to their home countries or to US military or civilian prisons. But Congress is deeply opposed and expected to block the move. The prison costs $445m (£316m) to run annually and closing it was an early promise from President Barack Obama. He told reporters on Tuesday the prison undermines national security. "This is about closing a chapter in our history," said Mr Obama. "It reflects the lessons we've learned since...

President Barack Obama on Tuesday presented a long-awaited plan to Congress to shut down the controversial detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, insisting that keeping the prison open is "contrary to our values." "It's been clear that the detention center at Guantanamo Bay does not advance our national security," Obama said from the Roosevelt Room at the White House. "It undermines our standing in the world." The plan, which has been on Obama's agenda since he took office in 2009, hinges on the transfer of between 30 and 60 detainees to U.S. soil, and suggesting several possible locations in South Carolina,...

U.S. officials say the Pentagon's long-awaited plan to shut down the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and transfer the remaining detainees to a facility in the United States calls for up to $475 million in construction costs that would ultimately be offset by as much as $180 million per year in operating cost savings. The plan, which will be delivered to Congress Tuesday, is the administration's last-ditch effort to make good on President Barack Obama's campaign vow to close Guantanamo and convince lawmakers to allow the Defense Department to move nearly 60 detainees to the U.S. But the plan...

Eric Holder: We aim to close Gitmo before Election Day By: MJ Lee September 20, 2011 09:46 AM EDT U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said on Tuesday the Obama administration is doing everything it can to shut down the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, before the 2012 presidential elections. Speaking at the European Parliament, Holder said the administration is focused on closing the controversial facility “as quickly as possible, recognizing that we will face substantial pressure,” the Associated Press reports. He added that the effort to shutter the detention facility would continue even after the 2012 elections if they...

Attorney General Eric Holder has developed a bad habit of accusing others of acting in bad faith while doing so himself. Take the issue of Guantanamo Bay. In Aspen, Colo., last week, Holder accused Congress of playing politics in preventing President Obama from closing the Gitmo detention center -- as Obama had promised to do within a year of his inauguration. But this accusation is disingenuous for a variety of reasons. Obama campaigned on calls to reverse the Bush administration anti-terrorism protocols, charging that they were either unnecessary or counterproductive. Then, when invested with the responsibility of governance, he reversed...

Remember President Obama's first full day in office: "The record is clear: Rather than keep us safer, the prison at Guantanamo has weakened American national security," Obama said during an address on national security at the National Archives in Washington. "It is a rallying cry for our enemies. It sets back the willingness of our allies to work with us in fighting an enemy that operates in scores of countries. By any measure, the costs of keeping it open far exceed the complications involved in closing it." At the time the President was roundly criticized for announcing the closing without...