Donald Trump says thousands of migrants will be housed in new Guantanamo Bay detention centre

Guantanamo Bay is infamous.

A strip of land on the Cuban coast – leased in perpetuity from Cuba since 1903.

It’s the site of a notorious US military prison where detainees were taken and held after the September 11 attacks.

It has become synonymous with the US “war on terror”, with CIA rendition, with torture and with orange jumpsuits.

Beyond the prison (which only has 15 inmates remaining) the site houses a US naval base and a small migrant holding centre – used at the moment to hold migrants who are intercepted at sea trying to reach America.

President Trump’s announcement that he has ordered the Department of Defence to prepare “Gitmo”, as it’s called, to house many more migrants is unexpected.

30,000 beds represents a colossal facility. It is not clear, yet, whether the migrants to be held here will be those intercepted or those rounded up in the US to be deported.

The numbers of migrants currently crossing into the US are very low and the numbers being rounded up are high – this gives an indication of who could be housed there.

In fulfilling its immigration mass deportation pledge, the White House is likely to be faced with significant logistical challenges with holding facilities.

The optics of using Guantanamo to house deported migrants is stark – reflective of the hardline policy being pursued by Trump.

At its peak, about 680 people, most suspected of terrorism and being “illegal enemy combatants”, were held at the American-run prison in Cuba.

The facility has been criticised by human rights groups and legal campaigners over potential breaches of international laws and conditions.

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel deemed the decision as “an act of brutality” in a message on his X account, and he described the base as one “located in illegally occupied Cuba territory”.

In response to Mr Trump’s announcement, former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci – who briefly served under the previous Trump administration – said: “Also known as a concentration camp.

“Yet no dissent. No courageous political leader willing to stand up to this.”

RFK Jr faces Senate hearing

Earlier on Wednesday, Mr Kennedy – the president’s pick to be health secretary – faced a grilling over his views on vaccines, abortion and Medicaid at a Senate confirmation hearing.

Appearing at the Capitol, Democratic senators raised some of the 71-year-old’s previous remarks comparing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to Nazi death camps, linking school shootings to antidepressants, and his claim that “no vaccine is safe and effective”.

One senator, Sheldon Whitehouse, told Mr Kennedy “frankly, you frighten people” when discussing an outbreak of measles in Rhode Island – its first since 2013.

The nominee said he did “not have a broad proposal for dismantling” Medicaid – a state and federal taxpayer-funded healthcare programme – and dismissed claims he was anti-vaccine by saying his children were vaccinated.

Mr Kennedy – the son of Robert F Kennedy and nephew of former US president John F Kennedy – was also questioned on his previous support for abortion and was shown statements as recent as from when he was running for president as an independent.

He said he now agrees with the president that “every abortion is a tragedy”.

Source : https://news.sky.com/story/trump-signs-order-for-guantanamo-bay-migrant-detention-centre-13299062