Does the President have the power to kill on U.S. soil?

www.msnbc.msn.com...

Feb. 13, 2006 issue - In the latest twist in the debate over presidential powers, a Justice Department official suggested that in certain circumstances, the president might have the power to order the killing of terrorist suspects inside the United States. Steven Bradbury, acting head of the department's Office of Legal Counsel, went to a closed-door Senate intelligence committee meeting last week to defend President George W. Bush's surveillance program. During the briefing, said administration and Capitol Hill officials (who declined to be identified because the session was private), California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein asked Bradbury questions about the extent of presidential powers to fight Al Qaeda; could Bush, for instance, order the killing of a Qaeda suspect known to be on U.S. soil? Bradbury replied that he believed Bush could indeed do this, at least in certain circumstances.

Current and former government officials said they could think of several scenarios in which a president might consider ordering the killing of a terror suspect inside the United States. One former official noted that before Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania, top administration officials weighed shooting down the aircraft if it got too close to Washington, D.C. What if the president had strong evidence that a Qaeda suspect was holed up with a dirty bomb and was about to attack? University of Chicago law professor Cass Sunstein says the post-9/11 congressional resolution authorizing the use of military force against Al Qaeda empowered the president to kill 9/11 perpetrators, or people who assisted their plot, whether they were overseas or inside the United States. On the other hand, Sunstein says, the president would be on less solid legal ground were he to order the killing of a terror suspect in the United States who was not actively preparing an attack.

A Justice Department official, who asked not to be ID'd because of the sensitive subject, said Bradbury's remarks were made during an "academic discussion" of theoretical contingencies. In real life, the official said, the highest priority of those hunting a terrorist on U.S. soil would be to capture that person alive and interrogate him. At a public intel-committee hearing, Feinstein was told by intel czar John Negroponte and FBI chief Robert Mueller that they were unaware of any case in which a U.S. agency was authorized to kill a Qaeda-linked person on U.S. soil. Tasia Scolinos, a Justice Department spokeswoman, told NEWSWEEK: "Mr. Bradbury's meeting was an informal, off-the-record briefing about the legal analysis behind the president's terrorist-surveillance program. He was not presenting the legal views of the Justice Department on hypothetical scenarios outside of the terrorist-surveillance program."

Well...thats a good question, does the President have the power to order to killing of a potential terrorist? Have to look that up. However, since we have yet to kill any terrorists here at home, and all we have done is capture them, then there is probably no concern over such issue, not to mention the only time if the terrorists were killed is if they fired back when FBI or police conducted a raid on a terrorist cell.

Killing a Potential terrorist ? hum the problem is . . . that were the line is drawn as to what a terrorist may be.

How about one that dislike the president that is a potential terrorist.

Hey the president pretty much can tag anybody a potential terrorist and just kill it. right?

It will be his right looking at the way that things are heading.

He already has killed the US by not closing the borders. Now its just a matter of time.

I agree with Marge on this one.(A shocker) How can we be sure who is a terrorist and who isnt? Unless theyve been doing some heavy surveillance, bugging phones and email, on-site surveillance ect. and its a slam dunk, I would say no. Tough decision to make, especially if your intel says you have very little time to decide and look at what you know for sure. So many factors, but I still must say that the line can be very blurry without the propor investigation into the person you are looking into.

Oddly enough I find myself in agreement with all of you. That is such a murky gray area. I don't think I even have an opinion as yet. This requires some serious thought. I am sure I'll have an opininon later though.

Originally posted by ludaChris
I agree with Marge on this one.(A shocker

) How can we be sure who is a terrorist and who isnt? Unless theyve been doing some heavy surveillance, bugging phones and email, on-site surveillance ect. and its a slam dunk, I would say no. Tough decision to make, especially if your intel says you have very little time to decide and look at what you know for sure. So many factors, but I still must say that the line can be very blurry without the propor investigation into the person you are looking into.

You mean like in WACO?

anyone find anything a little strange about that article?

Feb. 13, 2006 issue - In the latest twist in the debate over presidential powers, a Justice Department official suggested that in certain circumstances, the president might have the power to order the killing of terrorist suspects inside the United States. Steven Bradbury, acting head of the department's Office of Legal Counsel, went to a closed-door Senate intelligence committee meeting last week to defend President George W. Bush's surveillance program. During the briefing, said administration and Capitol Hill officials (who declined to be identified because the session was private), California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein asked Bradbury questions about the extent of presidential powers to fight Al Qaeda; could Bush, for instance, order the killing of a Qaeda suspect known to be on U.S. soil? Bradbury replied that he believed Bush could indeed do this, at least in certain circumstances.

it's dated Feb. 13th, 2006, last time i checked today's only the 6th. . . time travel news source? heheh, j/k, just thought i'd point that out. . . .

Originally posted by decidedlyundecided

it's dated Feb. 13th, 2006, last time i checked today's only the 6th. . . time travel news source? heheh, j/k, just thought i'd point that out. . . .

Maybe if you look at the link more, it says Newsweek, which is a magazine. Makes you wonder if its for the newest edition.

Who are terrorists exactly?

The government is supposed to weaker than the people so that if the government took a power hungry and/or controlling path that the people didn't want, they could overthrow the government.

If the government can do this, they can now just label any uprising against the government a 'terrorist' organization and order some bombs and fries to go.

Doggone I'm not liking where the US is going.

I fear any President , most especially the current one, assuming such authority. Historically, those who assume to themselves, for whatever justification, the power of life and death, do more harm than good.

Further, I fear that if such measures were to be taken, the loss of innocent lives would be wholly unacceptable.

Consider for a moment if the recent attack in Pakistan on an alleged member of Al-Quieda had taken place instead in, say Cleveland, Ohio. Consider how many otherwise innocent Americans would have been sacrificed, without their consent, when the missle(s) blew their apartment building into rubble.

The only crime those innocents would be guilty of would be to have been living in proximity to some one the President wanted immediately dead.

We might console ourselves with the belief that any operation on Our soil would be conducted with the utmost care and planning, but....

this is nothing more than a Belief!

In the "fog of war" sometimes "things happen"; reason is sometimes clouded, communications misinterpeted, and accidents are always a possibility.

If this were not the case, would not the "second most danerous man in the World" be dead now?

[edit on 6-2-2006 by Bhadhidar]

So I would have to say yes, the president has authority to kill, on US soil.

Presidential trivia any one?

That does sort of set a presidence doesn't it? So if the need to proactively kill a terrorist in the US arises the president him/herself can do it. Cool.

Originally posted by ADVISOR
So I would have to say yes, the president has authority to kill, on US soil.

Presidential trivia any one?

Thomas Jefferson actually shot a man for treason? Who did he execute? I never heard of this.

That's just stupid. In fact "possible terrorists" are likely to have been killed...we just don't know about it.

All in alll, Bush should excercise this authority and kill himself.

how many people from various groups, like green peace ect, have they been watching, going thru their trash, ect.......are these the terrorists he want to have killed???

define terrorist....

is a group of people boarding a ship in one of our harbors and throwing it's freight into the ocean a terrorist act?........BOSTON TEA PARTY!!!

there is a very fine line drawn between terrorist and freedom fighter. and in today's time, well, sometimes I get the impression that being just a political activist might happen to fit the bill. first draw the line, then we can discuss just how much power we want to give one man over the lives of these "terrorists".



[edit on 6-2-2006 by dawnstar]

Actually it may not even be true, as that tid bit comes from the movie Swordfish. But I would not put it past the man, as he is the type who would not hesitate to do so, especially in those times. So I might have lied, just scanned the entire internet for the facts and didn't find a single thing.

However I did learn that it was Jefferson who fired the first shot at Lexington and Concord.

In my opinion the President has the legal authority to order the killing of a terrorist in only one circumstance. That one circumstance is that the terrorist must be in the process of carrying out his attack. For example, a terrorist hijacks a plane and begins flying it toward Washington, now, in this scenario the President should have the right to order the plane shot down.

he has the power to kill a yak from 200 yards away with this new high tech comp bow