House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce (R-CA) introduced the Terrorist Release Transparency Act, H.R. 4580, on Tuesday.
The legislation aims to ensure that the public, along with foreign partners, have access to critical details before terrorists are released from the Guantanamo Bay prison camp.
“The detainees who remain at the prison today are among the most hardened and highly trained terrorists, committed to killing Americans,” Royce said. “Releasing them or transferring them to U.S. soil will not make us safer. That’s why bipartisan majorities in Congress have acted year after year to bar the administration from bringing these dangerous terrorists to U.S. soil. And that’s why we must also take steps to bring much-needed transparency to the process in which detainees are freed to foreign nations.”
Royce added that news reports indicate that one former Guantanamo Bay detainee was arrested, along with a jihadi cell, by Spanish and Moroccan authorities. Authorities have described him as a person who was trained in handling weapons, explosives and military tactics.
Royce said that he hopes that his legislation will bring scrutiny to the Obama administration’s push to transfer detainees out of the prison before Obama’s term ends. This legislation would require the State Department to provide an unclassified notice so that citizens have the knowledge of where these detainees might be going.