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# Obama’s Guantánamo Plan Projects $335 Million in Savings but Faces a Congressional Wall
- URL: https://www.theamericanquorum.com/obama-guantanamo-closure-plan-congress/
- Published: 2016-02-28T04:59:00.000Z
- Updated: 2016-02-28T04:59:00.000Z
- Description: President Obama proposed moving 30 to 60 Guantánamo detainees to a secure U.S. facility, projecting at least $335 million in 10-year savings but facing firm congressional resistance.
- Author: TAQ Staff
- Tags: US, #Import 2026-08-30 05:24

President Obama sent Congress a plan Tuesday to close the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where 91 men remain and where the government spent nearly $450 million last year to hold fewer than 100 detainees.

The proposal would transfer 35 men already approved for resettlement to other countries, accelerate reviews of others, continue military or federal prosecutions where possible, and move an estimated 30 to 60 detainees to a secure facility in the United States. The administration said that move could reduce annual operating costs by $65 million to $85 million and produce at least $335 million in net savings over a decade.

But the plan immediately encountered the same barrier that has kept the prison open throughout Obama’s presidency: federal law prohibits bringing Guantánamo detainees onto American soil. Republican leaders said they would not lift that restriction, while even lawmakers who have favored closing the prison criticized the administration for identifying 13 possible domestic facilities without naming a preferred site.

## Four steps, one decisive obstacle

In [remarks](https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/02/23/remarks-president-plan-close-prison-guantanamo-bay?ref=theamericanquorum.com) from the Roosevelt Room, Obama described the plan as the final effort to end a detention system he says drains military resources, harms cooperation with allies and supplies propaganda to terrorist groups. He noted that nearly 800 people have passed through Guantánamo since it opened in 2002 and that more than 85 percent have been transferred elsewhere.

The [Defense Department](https://www.war.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/671548/dod-submits-guantanamo-closure-plan-to-congress/?ref=theamericanquorum.com) divided the remaining task into four lines of effort. Officials would continue negotiated transfers for detainees cleared by a multiagency review; speed periodic reviews for men whose continued detention remains under examination; pursue criminal prosecution or military commissions when evidence and law permit; and work with Congress on a secure domestic site for the residual population.

The last step cannot occur under present law. Congress has barred the use of funds to transfer Guantánamo prisoners to the United States, including for prosecution or continued law-of-war detention. The administration therefore presented the document as a basis for negotiation rather than an executable closure order.

The plan says officials studied 13 military, federal and state facilities to develop a cost range, but it withholds their names. Sites publicly discussed during earlier surveys include the military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, the Navy brig near Charleston, South Carolina, and a maximum-security federal complex in Colorado. The absence of a selection avoided an immediate local battle but weakened the document’s reception on Capitol Hill.

## A financial case built around a smaller population

The cost comparison is unusually stark because Guantánamo maintains a large, isolated military operation for a shrinking number of prisoners. Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said recurring expenses would be $65 million to $85 million higher each year in Cuba than at a domestic facility. Construction and transition costs in the United States were estimated at $290 million to $475 million, with those expenses recovered within three to five years.

Depending on the facility and the size of the remaining population, the administration projects savings of at least $335 million over 10 years and as much as $1.7 billion over 20 years. A [Reuters account](https://www.reuters.com/article/world/obama-makes-last-attempt-to-persuade-congress-to-close-guantanamo-idUSKCN0VW1NB/?ref=theamericanquorum.com) of the proposal said the prison would retain 30 to 60 detainees after transfers and reviews, a wide range reflecting unresolved cases and the difficulty of finding countries willing to accept some men.

Those figures also depend on Congress permitting a domestic facility and appropriating the money needed to modify it. The plan does not resolve whether a military installation, federal prison or state institution would be used, and security specifications would influence both initial construction and recurring costs.

Supporters of closure emphasize the disparity between Guantánamo and existing maximum-security prisons. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Senate Democrat, said in a [statement](https://www.durbin.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/durbin-statement-on-presidents-plan-to-close-guantanamo-bay-detention-facility?ref=theamericanquorum.com) that Guantánamo costs more than $4.9 million per detainee annually, compared with roughly $86,000 for dangerous prisoners at a federal supermax facility. Opponents answer that military detainees present different legal, intelligence and security demands than ordinary federal inmates.

## Congressional resistance hardens

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Congress had already expressed bipartisan opposition to placing detainees in American communities. House Speaker Paul Ryan argued that the proposal lacked details required by law and failed to demonstrate that a domestic transfer would improve national security.

Senator John McCain of Arizona presented a more complicated challenge. McCain has long said Guantánamo should close under a credible detention policy, and he helped write the requirement that produced Tuesday’s submission. Yet he called the result a menu of possibilities rather than a plan because it did not choose a facility or establish a durable policy for future terrorism suspects.

A contemporaneous [congressional review](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/02/23/top-republicans-slam-obamas-plan-to-close-guantanamo/?ref=theamericanquorum.com) recorded similar objections from House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, who said the document offered cost estimates without the operational detail Congress requested. Colorado Senator Michael Bennet, a Democrat who has supported closing Guantánamo, reiterated his opposition to moving military detainees to his state.

The political geography matters. Naming one site would expose its congressional delegation and surrounding communities to immediate pressure. Naming none, however, gives opponents grounds to say the administration has not answered the most practical question. The plan’s flexibility is therefore also its central vulnerability.

## The legal dispute beneath the location debate

Moving prisoners would not by itself end the harder controversy over indefinite wartime detention. Some detainees face prosecution, others have been approved for transfer, and a residual group is considered too dangerous to release even though the government may not be able to try them. The proposal would relocate that system rather than abolish it.

Legal scholars examining the plan noted that an accompanying Justice Department analysis found no constitutional or statutory rule that would automatically require detainees brought to the United States to be released or allowed to remain permanently. A [legal analysis](https://www.justsecurity.org/29478/presidents-plan-closing-guantanamo-bay-detention-facility/?ref=theamericanquorum.com) by Georgetown professor Marty Lederman said Congress could add explicit safeguards if lawmakers remained concerned about immigration or removal claims.

Opponents are not persuaded that relocation is worth the legal risk. They also question whether former detainees transferred abroad can be monitored effectively and whether closure would deprive the military of a useful place to hold future captives. The administration says each transfer is subject to security arrangements negotiated with receiving governments and that existing domestic prisons already hold convicted terrorists without incident.

Obama acknowledged that the plan cannot proceed without legislation and asked Congress for a fair hearing. He has declined to rule out examining executive authority, but any attempt to transfer detainees in defiance of the statutory ban would invite an immediate constitutional challenge.

The submission thus defines the choice more clearly without resolving it. The administration has supplied a population estimate, a cost model and a four-part process. Congress retains control over the step that determines whether the facility can actually close. After seven years of argument, the dispute is no longer primarily about whether the government can devise an alternative. It is about whether the elected branches will agree to use one.