Obama to Disregard Congressional Restrictions on Civilian Trials for GTMO Detainees?

Dafna Linzer reports that President Obama’s advisors are urging him to issue a signing statement proclaiming that certain aspects of the defense spending bill that limit his authority to try GTMO detainees in civilian courts are unconstitutional because they infringe upon his Article II powers of prosecutorial discretion.  Administration officials claim that such a statement “could amount to a presidential intent to disregard some, but not all, of the provisions relating to Guantanamo detainees.”  This comes on the heels of President Obama’s six recess appointments (including the appointment of James Cole as Deputy Attorney General) and of the Obama bureaucracy stepping up regulations that serve legislative goals unachievable in Congress.  I’ll have more to say on the interesting Linzer article later (including its new details about the forthcoming Executive order on long-term review for some GTMO detainees, and the administration’s thinking on what to do with the remaining detainees).  The point for now is that, as predicted, and unsurprisingly, the Obama administration is stepping up its reliance on unilateral presidential power in the face of an increasingly hostile Congress.