Former Bush Admin AG Slams Holder On 9/11 Trials

Fmr. Attorney General Michael Mukasey
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Just a few minutes ago, former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey slammed his successor, Eric Holder, over Holder’s decision to bring five terror suspects from Guantanamo Bay to New York to try them as planners of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

“It shows a willingness to disclose how our intelligence process works and offer [the suspects] a platform in our legal system to gather intelligence for themselves,” Mukasey said before an audience of conservative lawyers at the national Federalist Society’s annual legal convention in Washington.

Holder’s plan “creates a cornucopia of intelligence for those still at large and a circus for those being tried,” Mukasey said.

“This step appears to have come from a desire to close Guantanamo Bay within a year,” he added, “and to show the world we can do not only what the law allows — but more.”

Mukasey, who served as Attorney General during the last year of George W. Bush’s administration, largely echoed the conservative line on Holder’s announcement today, claiming that trying terror suspects inside the U.S. are an invitation for new terrorist attacks.

“They’re not going to escape,” Mukasey said when asked about the detention facility in New York City where the suspects will likely be held under Holder’s plan. “The question is whether the city will become the focus for more mischief, for more murder.”

Mukasey said, “it will.”

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