Thread by @eclectictalk

Sen. Lindsey Graham Questions Brett Kavanaugh at Confirmation Hearing for Supreme Court

(LG), "Let's talk about the law and war. Is there a body of law called the law of armed conflict?
(BK), "There is such a body Senator."

(LG), "Is there a body of law that's called basic criminal law?"
(BK), "Yes Senator."
(LG), "Are there differences between those two bodies of law?"
(BK), "Yes Senator."

(LG), "Isn't there also long-settled law that, that it goes back to the Eisentrager case... I can't remember the name of it."
(BK), "Johnson v. Eisentrager."
(LG), "Right. That American citizens who collaborate with the enemy are considered enemy combatants."
(BK), "they can be."

(LG), "They can be."
(BK), "They're often... some... they're sometimes criminally prosecuted, sometimes treated in the military."
(LG), "Let's talk about can be. I think the...
(BK), "Under Supreme Court precedent."

(LG), "Right. There's a Supreme Court decision that said that American citizens who collaborated with Nazi saboteurs were tried by the military. Is that correct?
(BK), "That is correct."
(LG), "I think a couple of were executed."
(BK), "Yeah."

(LG), "So, if anybody doubts there's a long-standing history in this country that your constitutional rights follow you wherever you go but you don't have a constitutional right to turn on your own government collaborate with the enemy of the nation you'll be...

treated differently... what's the name of the case if you can recall that reaffirmed the concept that you could hold one of our own is an enemy combatant if there were engaged in terrorist activities in Afghanistan are you familiar with that case?

(BK), "Yeah, Hamdi." (Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507 (2004), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court recognized the power of the U.S. government to detain enemy combatants, including U.S. citizens...)

(LG), "Okay so the bottom line is on every American says to no you have constitutional rights but you do not have a constitutional right to collaborate with the enemy. there's a body of law well developed long before 9/11 that understood the difference between basic criminal...

...law and the law of armed conflict. do you understand those differences?

(BK), "I do understand that they're different bodies of law of course."

/End

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