Thread by @JonathanHafetz

Today’s #SCOTUS arguments in the Zubaydah case provide a tour de force in how torture has corrupted the U.S. legal system and corrupted it absolutely. /1

Incredibly, the U.S. government continues to persist in the Orwellian notion that a human being could be gagged from talking about their own torture by the very government responsible for torturing them. 2/

Also, buried in the Zubaydah argument is Justice Breyer’s incredulity that the U.S. government is still detaining people without charge at #Gtmo when the war in Afghanistan has ended.
supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments…
(at p.72). /2

Hopefully, the DC Circuit, now sitting en banc to consider a detainee habeas petition in Al-Hela, is paying close attention. /4

As I’ve explained, the end of the war in Afghanistan should matter a great deal for all remaining #gtmo detainees who've not been charged with a crime, both on substance and process.
justsecurity.org/77992/what-the… @just_security /5

@just_security Also buried in the Zubaydah argument is the SG’s continuing embrace of the global war on terror paradigm, defending (yet, again) the position that the U.S. can detain people indefinitely as a simple wartime matter even when the war itself has ended. (Tr. at 79). /6

@just_security The SG's statement was in response to a question from Justice Kavanaugh that was clearly aimed at quashing further discussion and debate over Breyer’s $64,000 question. Not surprising, but still disappointing to see this from the Biden administration. /7