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Binghamton Residents Wait for Flood to Recede; Supreme Court Rules Against Military Tribunals for Gitmo Detainees

Aired June 29, 2006 - 13:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, HOST: Hello. I'm Fredricka Whitfield in for Kyra Phillips.
State of emergency. The northeast fights the floods. Lives have been lost and buildings swept away. The fight to save towns is on from Pennsylvania to Maryland. People are doing everything they can to save what they can. Thousands are homeless. Their stories straight ahead.

And the Supreme Court makes an historic decision on war crime trials. Big questions: how much power does the president have in times of war? LIVE FROM starts right now.

Record-setting rainfall, record-setting floods. Although the water is receding in Binghamton, New York, much of the town is still submerged.

CNN's Allan Chernoff joins us from a town where sunny skies don't match the mood of most of the residents right now.

ALLAN CHERNOFF, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Fredricka. This is the second consecutive day of beautiful sunshine here, yet still the floodwaters are flowing, as you can see.

As a matter of fact, I'm standing on someone's front lawn right now. The actual bank of the river is about 80 yards behind me. So you can see just how dramatic the flooding has been. And homes like this have been surrounded by floodwaters for several days now.

As a matter of fact, the owner of this home told me that she and her husband brought all of their possessions that were on the first floor up to the second floor except for their sofa. And they're hoping that they can salvage as much as possible from their home.

About 15,000 people in this region were evacuated. They also have been without electricity. Of course, the water has to recede before the electricity can be turned back on. And there were four fatalities on the roads as a result of this storm.

The good news: the water is receding and very dramatically. All of this land on which I'm standing right now, this was all underwater yesterday.

And let me just walk up the road here to show you how high the water actually went. Late yesterday afternoon, it hit over here. And you can see the rocks left by the water. And at one point, it went even higher, all the way here, where there's some bark and other debris that the water deposited.

But the very good news, as you can see, the water is now receding very rapidly. I'd estimate probably about a foot every hour.

WHITFIELD: And so, Allan, at its peak when a lot of the water came rushing into the homes just like you demonstrated a moment ago with that one house that -- whose yard you were in, did a lot of people say they were in their homes or did they get out in time at the time of that mandatory evacuation to escape being underwater themselves?

CHERNOFF: Well, let me step back into the water -- yes, let me step back in so you can get a sense here. Look at how much water there is. And this is after so much receding. All of this was dry land.

So people were evacuated, to answer your question, were evacuated very quickly. I did speak to a firefighter earlier today, who said he personally evacuated five people from homes yesterday by boat. But the majority of people of course did leave before they had to have boats come pick them up.

WHITFIELD: Did most folks feel like they had good enough warning to take that evacuation order seriously?

CHERNOFF: Yes. I mean, last year there was flooding here, as well. Not on this magnitude. But after last year's experience, I think a lot of people recognized that Mother Nature sometimes does not fool around. And so they certainly did clear out.

Thankfully, there have been no fatalities reported from people actually trying to remain in their homes.

WHITFIELD: That is good news. All right. Allan Chernoff, thanks so much, in Binghamton, New York.

Troubled waters also flow across Pennsylvania. As the Susquehanna slowly recedes, new problems come to light there. Damage and debris as far as the eye can see, plus a need for fresh drinking water.

Tens of thousands of people have just been given the OK to go back to their homes to take some stock. Two-thirds of Pennsylvania's counties remain under states of emergency.

The governor is calling it a disaster along the Delaware. That river is still rising and expected to crest this hour in New Hope, just north of Philadelphia.

And along the Delaware, in New Jersey, the warning is don't go home. This is the scene in Trenton, where the ribbon -- river is expected to crest at a little over 25 feet. That would make it the city's fourth worst flood on record. Only after the water recedes and officials inspect homes and businesses will townspeople be allowed to return there. Pretty remarkable pictures. And so far, the dam is holding around Maryland's Lake Needwood, but engineers say the threat of collapse isn't over. A mandatory evacuation order remains in effect on the north side of Rockville. Police are still trying to persuade about 100 holdouts to move to higher ground as floodwaters head downstream into already swollen rivers. The danger is not passed.

Meteorologist Reynolds Wolf has more on the severe weather threats all along the East Coast -- Reynolds.

REYNOLDS WOLF, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Absolutely. Slowly but surely, things are slowly beginning to cooperate in terms of Mother Nature. We are going to see a chance of showers into the afternoon. And it's true that we don't need any more rain in this part of the world. We're talking about from, say, New York southward into portions of Virginia and a few spots in between. We don't need any rainfall. There may be some this afternoon, but it is not going to compare with the heavy rainfall that we had over the past four or five days or so.

Here's what we do have. We're starting to see some development back in western New York, south of Buffalo, some over Lake Erie. As we zoom back just a little bit, you'll see more telltale showers here and there, splash and dash activity, really in that big concentration of showers and storms.

The bulk of the rainfall anywhere close by, thankfully, is off the coast and moving deeper into the Atlantic. So that is one thing it's really working into our favor.

Now, there is the potential of seeing about a half inch of rainfall or less as we make our way over the next 12 to 24 to 48 hours all through this region in New England. Then as we get even deeper into the weekend, we are expecting drier air back into this region, which is exactly what we need. But again, we still have to deal with the cresting in many places, many of these rivers, especially late afternoon and into the evening, as well.

That is the latest on your forecast.

Let's send it right back to you, Fred.

WHITFIELD: All right. Thanks so much, Reynolds.

WOLF: You bet.

WHITFIELD: Our other big story today, no go at Gitmo. The Supreme Court ruled 5-3 today against the Bush administration's plans to hold military war crimes trials for terror suspects being held at Guantanamo Bay. The justices say the tribunals would violate U.S. law and the Geneva Conventions.

CNN national correspondent Bob Franken has more -- Bob.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is a repudiation of the administration's contention that the president had the inherent power to decide how to handle matters like this and that he also had congressional authorization.

The justices in a ruling that was quite fractured nevertheless ended up with a result that said Geneva Conventions should apply to the extent these detainees, these prisoners, should be tried either by a court-martial procedure under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. That's what governs the United States armed forces. Or in the civil courts of the U.S.

It did, however, hold open the possibility that Congress could come up with approved legislation that might allow the administration to proceed as it planned.

But for the moment, nothing is going to happen. The man who represented the plaintiff in this case, one of 10, who is going to be tried before the military commission, Lieutenant Commander Charles Swift. He represented the person who had been tried, was about to be tried as a former bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden. The defendant's name is Ahmed Salim Hamdan. His lawyer's name is Lieutenant Commander Charles Swift.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LT. COMMANDER CHARLES SWIFT, LAWYER FOR AHMED SALIM HAMDAN: Well, the president I think has laid out the path in speeches right before this decision saying that he's committed -- and we're heartened to hear that on behalf of my client and myself -- to holding fair trials. He was looking for the Supreme Court to give him guidance. Well, they've done that here today, and we're ready to defend him. I've already been ready to defend him in a fair trial.

(END VIDEO CIP)

FRANKEN: So what's a president to do? There was an opportunity shortly after this ruling came down to ask President Bush. And in effect, he gave a non-answer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'll, one, assure you that we take them very seriously. Two, that -- to the extent that there is latitude to work with the Congress to determine whether or not the military tribunals will be an avenue in which to give people their day in court, we will do so.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FRANKEN: Back to your original question, what happens next? The answer probably is nothing. The justices explicitly said they were not ruling on the propriety of holding these detainees indefinitely even, nor were they making any indication of what should happen with the Guantanamo Bay prison camp -- Fredricka.

WHITFIELD: All right. Bob Franken at the Supreme Court, thanks so much.

Well, today's ruling raises a lot of questions about the legal status of the Guantanamo detainees, all of them. Let's check in now with CNN senior legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin.

Jeffrey, how big a blow is this to the executive powers?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Oh, it's really a major blow. This has been a touchstone of the administration's anti-terrorism policy. Guantanamo Bay is an international symbol of American law. And what today's ruling says is the procedures that the procedures that the administration has set up to try these people are unacceptable. Back to the drawing board. And that's where the administration is now.

WHITFIELD: So if they can't prosecute Hamdan in a U.S. military tribunal, how long can the U.S. take to explore its options? We heard from Bush earlier today, who said, "My legal team is exploring the options."

TOOBIN: Well, the decision today puts no time limit. And I think it's safe to say that these -- that these 450 people in Guantanamo, they're not going anywhere any time soon. But the administration has to come up eventually with another plan. And it looks like Congress will probably cooperate with them to have a new system of military tribunals, these commissions, these sort of mini trials that the...

WHITFIELD: But they couldn't be called that?

TOOBIN: Sorry?

WHITFIELD: They couldn't be called that, right?

TOOBIN: Well, they -- sure they could. They can call it anything they want. They're making it up from scratch.

One possibility, another possibility is some of the 450 may be tried in the American courts. Some of the 450 may be tried in court- martials. Some of them, like others in Guantanamo Bay before, have been sent back to the countries where they were captured. So through some combination of all those scenarios, that's how most of these people will be dealt with. But it's going to take years.

WHITFIELD: And what are some of the concerns that you have if that latter option is used, if some of those detainees were released, sent back? Might it be under the agreement? Perhaps the U.S. would make an agreement with their home countries that they would have to be tried there? Or would they just be set free?

TOOBIN: Well, there are two very different sets of problems with the -- returning -- returning the prisoners to the Middle East, which is basically where they came from. Some of them are supposed to be incredibly dangerous. They're terrorists. So we don't want them walking around.

The other -- the other problem is sort of from the other end. Some of the governments to which we would return these people are known for torturing. And we don't want to be party to torturing people. So we have to diplomatically figure out how we're going to return these people. They have returned some of them to Saudi Arabia and other places, but it's a complicated problem.

WHITFIELD: So Jeffrey, how might today's ruling from the Supreme Court in any way impact any U.S. plans in the future or from here on out of any new prisoners or detainees who are supposed to be on the way to Guantanamo?

TOOBIN: Well, it has -- it has a big impact. Because this is now the second time the U.S. Supreme Court has repudiated what the Bush administration has done with its prisoners in the war.

WHITFIELD: All right. And Jeffrey, let me just interrupt you right there. We want to go to the White House, where spokesperson Tony Snow is responding to some of these very questions.

TONY SNOW, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: There are national security teams, so we were able to give them a very quick gloss on what we, at that point, had known.

Even now, people are studying as carefully as they can what is a highly complex decision, trying to figure out what the ramifications are. But the president did point out, and it seems to be the point that Justice Stevens stressed from the bench today, that one of the most important things for the court in the majority opinion today was to get some congressional authorization.

Members of Congress, including Senator Graham on TV, have stepped forward and said that they'd be happy to work on that process. The president said he's willing to work with Congress on authorization to figure out how to move forward in a way consistent with the ruling handed down by the court.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This administration has said that, under the Constitution at a time of war, the president has had very far- reaching power to protect the American people. And the court seems to disagree and says the president overreached in that power.

SNOW: You know, it's -- overreached is the headline. It's not the way it's been written by the court. I mean, I've got the opinion here, and I defy anybody to come up with a very quick and simple analysis of the varied holdings in here. You've got people agreeing and disagreeing in part.

So I think what the court is saying is it wants to make sure that there's congressional authorization and that also it's concerned about comporting with the Geneva Conventions and also the Uniform Code of Military Justice. And those are matters that will be taken under advisement.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Those are things that this White House has basically said it did not have to do, that the executive has the authority to pursue this war without dealing with those other institutions.

SNOW: The court disagreed with that.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: So the president said, you know, before that he was waiting for the Supreme Court ruling before he would, you know, make any comments about it. But he also said that he really wanted to close it soon. So where do we stand with that?

SNOW: Well, you're talking about Guantanamo?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. The ruling didn't address the...

SNOW: Correct. In the ruling -- the president never said he wanted to -- he said he wants to close Guantanamo. He didn't say he wanted to close it quickly, because there are some practical considerations. They're approximately -- as quickly as possible, I believe. There's a difference, because you have a whole series of considerations.

There are approximately 100 prisoners we're still in the process of trying to repatriate. There's also a core of prisoners who are deemed so dangerous that their home countries won't even take them back.

There are a number of prisoners also that we think need to be held to justice within the United States system. And now you have to figure out how to go forward with that.

This will not mean closing down Guantanamo. There's nothing in this opinion that dictates closing down Guantanamo. And we're studying very carefully what other implications there may be. I think the most important thing at this point seems to be -- I don't want to fake being a lawyer, but I've had some pretty extensive consultations with our lawyers who are still pouring over this. I think the congressional consultation piece is going to be pretty important.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president has said, I want to close Guantanamo.

SNOW: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm waiting for this decision. You're just now saying, this doesn't mean we close Guantanamo. Isn't that...

SNOW: No, because he wanted to see the decision. And I think what the decision has done -- for instance, in the case of Mr. Hamdan, is it's now reverting it back to the first U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. There's no strict constitutional interpretation. As a matter of fact, this opinion does not talk about the Constitution.

And so what the president is trying to do and what the attorneys are trying to do both here in the White House and also the departments of justice and defense, is to figure out precisely what the court is saying here and how to proceed in a way that comports with it.

We will proceed as rapidly as we can to bring to justice those who have been held in Guantanamo, to repatriate as quickly as possible those who may be repatriated. And that's always been the goal.

I mean, it's -- but this is not a decision that lends itself to a very quick disposition, because what it has now done is added the extra element of bringing Congress in and saying to members of Congress, OK, congressional authorization. Section three of Justice Stevens' opinion deals with the issue of congressional authorization. And as I've mentioned, I think a number of members of Congress are going to want to weigh in on this -- Jim.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For the record, then, the president still stands by the idea that he wants to close Guantanamo Bay?

SNOW: Absolutely. Yes. That hasn't changed.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. Then as far as the congressional oversight, could you just flesh out for me...

SNOW: It's not oversight. It's authorization.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Authorization. Would you flesh out for me what that does?

SNOW: I wish I could. No, you've got to -- I think what it means is that they want to make sure that Congress authorizes, pursuant to Congress's obligations when it comes to declaring war and laying conditions for a war. It wants Congress to authorize the way to proceed forward in terms of bringing to justice those who have been brought in from the battlefield.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So doesn't that, by definition, mean the administration overreached in setting up its initial approach?

SNOW: I think it would say that the administration -- that the Supreme Court has disagreed with the approach we've taken. You may -- I don't know how you'd say overreached. Apply whatever adjective or whatever verb you want. The Supreme Court has said that it disagrees with the way in which the commissions were convened and has laid down some guidelines for proceeding.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But the idea is to maintain sort of the concept. It's just to make sure that it's rewritten with Congress' authorization, as you're saying.

SNOW: You've got to keep it -- you've got to keep -- the principle is you bring to justice people who are on the battlefield or have been apprehended in the process of committing acts of committing acts of terror or on the war fields of Afghanistan or elsewhere. And that principle remains the same. Nobody gets a "get out of jail free" card.

Instead now what we're doing is addressing the issue which the court sort of threw in the lap of both the Congress and the administration of figuring out what the court has decided is the proper way to proceed in trying to convene hearings for those who are being held.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you characterize the feeling upon hearing the ruling today? Was it disappointment?

SNOW: No. It really is -- again, this is -- I'll just describe to you -- have you guys had a chance to look at this?

OK. Here is -- first we have -- we have Justice Stevens. Here's his majority opinion. It's 73 pages long. Parts one through four have the concurrence of four other members of the court, but parts 5 and 6-D4 do not. Then you have Justice Breyer writing for justices Kennedy, Souter and Ginsburg.

Then you have Justice Kennedy, justices Souter and Ginsburg have adopted everything that he has, but Justice Breyer says, "No, I like parts one and two but not part three."

Then we get to the dissents. Justice Scalia writing with justices Thomas and Alito in full approval. Justice Thomas writes Justice Scalia likes it. Justice Alito agrees with parts 1, part 2-C1 and part 3-B2.

Then you have Justice Alito writing and justices Scalia and Thomas concur with parts one through three.

It's very difficult to come up with a snap parsing of that. So I think -- I think it's worth saying that the first reaction is, what does this mean? And there are a lot of very smart lawyers trying to pore through each and every part of that to figure out precisely what it does mean.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In addition to seeking congressional authorization for military tribunals or for whatever is next, what other possible next steps are there for the administration to take?

SNOW: Don't know and don't want to get into it, Jake. I would refer you -- I think the Justice Department is going to be trying to do a briefing later in the day. I would leave that to legal minds, who have got far greater standing to speak on it than I do.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. In addition to that, there was some strong rhetoric in some of these decisions -- the majority decisions. Kennedy writing in his separate opinion, said concentration of power, referring to specifically the executive branch, puts personal liberty in peril of arbitrary action by officials and incursion the Constitution's three part system is designed to avoid.

Is there any feeling in terms of the administration's reaction to that?

SNOW: No. Again, you're trying to frame this as a political fight, and it's not. The Supreme Court has now rendered its judgment in the Hamdan case. And it is now the obligation of the administration, which -- the president, who controls the executive branch, to figure out how to proceed, to create laws, to execute laws consistent with the Supreme Court's holding.

As you also know, Justice Thomas for the first time in his career, wrote an opinion from the bench. I mean, this is one where I think just looking from the recitation I just gave you, I think that there are pretty vigorous disagreements, vigorous differences, not merely among those who agreed on -- disagreed on the court but among those who agreed. So that's why there has to be some forbearance here.

I think the most important thing to realize is that section three holding by Justice Stevens, which talks about congressional authorization, I think that probably is the nub here. And Justice Stevens felt strongly enough about it that he did talk about that from the bench today.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I'm not trying to make it a political argument, but you guys -- the White House has put forward the argument that in extraordinary times the White House needs to take extraordinary measures and act -- and act as executive power on its own.

SNOW: Right.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And the Supreme Court, a majority ruling of the Supreme Court has said, no, you can't, not in this instance.

SNOW: Well, the majority of the Supreme Court, a lot of this is procedural, Jake. And that's why it gets complicated, and it gets pretty quickly beyond my brief. But if you take a look at it, a lot of it really is procedural. It has to do with congressional authorizations, the Uniform Code of Military Justice and so on.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Those are the steps that you guys bypassed.

SNOW: Well, and so those are not going to be bypassed in the future. And there's a disagreement. The Supreme Court has rendered its decision.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This way forward, working with Congress for authorization, isn't that basically a way to circumvent what the Supreme Court came down with today?

SNOW: Not when a justice says Congress can do this. That sounds to me to be -- and by the way, there may be other means of dealing with this. I do not want to give you the impression that is the one and only thing. But that seems to be something Justice Stevens seemed important enough to say from the bench, that Congress could write authorizing legislation to deal with this.

That's not circumventing the court. That's responding to what the author of the majority opinion had to say -- Cheryl. I'm sorry.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I had one more. The ruling today also seemed to say that the prisoners at Guantanamo should be treated in adherence to the Geneva Conventions. So what will that mean for the treatment of prisoners going forward?

SNOW: I -- that is something we're going to have to study. I'm not aware that it would involve any changes in the procedures by which prisoners are detained. But I think -- I better be careful about that, because I don't know for sure. But I know people are looking at that right now -- Cheryl.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Since this is an election year and these issues are extremely contentious on Capitol Hill...

SNOW: Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... is the president confident that Congress would even act to give him this authorizing legislation, No. 1? And No. 2, what happens in the interim?

SNOW: Well, in the interim, you have the detention of prisoners continues in Guantanamo. You will still have the process by which you continue to repatriate a number of prisoners. And then you've got to review the options for bringing the prisoners who are still in custody to justice.

I'm being -- I don't want to be too specific, because there are options. And, again, the lawyers have to weigh those.

As far as Congress, we're in a war. And we get reminded of that. Every time we seem to forget, we get harsh reminders. And I think members of Congress, certainly understanding -- many people on both sides of the aisle have been down to Guantanamo, and they've received briefings and they have the sense of what's going on and what kind of prisoners are under detention. They realize that it is important to bring them to justice. And I think they will feel some obligation to go ahead and act.

I don't want to speak on behalf of the House and Senate, but it is a political year. But, on the other hand, the one thing that you do find is general consensus, A, that we need to win the war on terror. B, we need to wage it seriously. And, C, we need to go ahead and bring to justice those who are at Guantanamo in a manner consistent with the law and with our obligations to human rights.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But is the net effect of this that these detainees will be held even longer, waiting?

SNOW: Well, they will be held.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For the type of court proceeding they could have?

SNOW: That possible could be the case, yes. That possibly could be the case.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tony, back on the issue of alleged overreaching, you're saying there were no straight Constitution interpretations. If that were the case, why not have -- why didn't this administration handle the tribunals in a very conservative or restrained way?

SNOW: April, I don't want to go second-guessing what happened. The administration proceeded in the manner it saw fit. The Supreme Court has reviewed is in the case of Mr. Hamdan, and we move forward. I don't think second-guessing -- I don't know what to do with it.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But the manner that they saw fit, some are saying overreached and was an abuse of power, if there were no guidelines...

SNOW: But there were guidelines. And, again, rather than getting into second-guessing -- I'm just not going to do it, April. It's -- it's complex enough to figure out precisely what this holding means. And a lot of people are going to work very hard to do their best to figure out what it means.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Don't you think the complexity should have been addressed early on as this war began? I mean, they tell us who is a prisoner of war versus a person who is not a soldier versus someone from al Qaeda...

SNOW: Who -- one of the interesting things here is there is no dispute these are enemy combatants and not traditional prisoners of war. That's never been a matter of dispute. This is a different kind of war, and I think it creates a different kind of legal atmosphere, and I think trying to second-guess in a situation like this might be an interesting academic exercise, but it's not something I'm going to entertain here.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The larger debate in the international community, does the decision today weaken the president's hand at all in trying to argue he does have wide latitude, as he says he does, in conducting the war on terror?

SNOW: No, I think what you're finding, actually, is increasing cooperation on the war on terror. You not only heard it today with Prime Minister Koizumi. You also have ongoing efforts -- Secretary Rice today is in St. Petersburg or in Moscow? She's in Moscow in a ministerial as preparation for the G8 summit next month in St. Petersburg.

You've got a lot of nations that realize that there's a war on terror, and they're figuring out the best way to proceed and to proceed together. I don't think it weakens the president's hand. And it certainly doesn't change the way in which we move as aggressively as possible to try to cut off terrorists before they can strike again.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... world leaders see a branch of the United states government disagrees with the administration's tactics in this one case.

SNOW: A branch -- there are always disagreements between branches of government. I mean, that's kind of the way the system works.

Yes, but that's -- but what the Supreme Court has not said, it has not said you can't hold them. It hasn't said you can't try them. It hasn't had -- it hasn't said you have to send them back. So what you do have are matters of procedure. And, no, I don't think it weakens the president's hand.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is this a setback in the -- in terms of the broader goal of this administration to expand executive authority?

SNOW: I don't think it's ever been the goal of the administration to expand executive authority. In a time of war the president has tried to act in a way that meets the needs and obligations of a commander in chief against a dispersed and highly unique kind of enemy.

But we don't have expanded executive power sessions. You know, it's -- so nobody thinks in terms of how do we expand executive power? This has been a time where the president has had to figure out how to maneuver in ways consistent with his obligations of commander in chief and consistent with the Constitution. And I dare say it's raising questions that are fairly new and people are wrestling with.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I do think the vice president has said that it was a broader goal to expand executive authority.

SNOW: Well, again, I missed the "expand executive authority" meetings.

Oh, I'm sorry. Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Separate issue. Quickly, I'm sorry. But what's the president doing to try to get the Voting Rights Act renewal moving in the House? There are a lot of conservative Republicans in the House who are opposing it for a variety of reasons. And he said it's a top priority. But what is he doing?

SNOW: It's a top priority. Well, there have been ongoing discussions through Candy Wolf, our head of legislative affairs, with members. And the president's position has been very clear. He wants it renewed.

WHITFIELD: All right. You've been listening to White House press secretary Tony Snow talk about a host of things, namely the Supreme Court ruling as it relates to Guantanamo. The U.S. not being able to carry on with military tribunals involving those detainees.

He did underscore while the president has made it very clear in the past that eventually he wants Gitmo to close, right now as a result of the Supreme Court ruling, no, the president is not moving in that direction, but they are studying the ramifications following today's ruling.

Straight ahead I'll speak with the attorney for Salim Ahmed Hamdan, the man at the center of this lawsuit. Attorney Neal Katyal joins me live.

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