Please join us in Chicago for a spirited demonstration and march, starting the Water Tower Park on Friday, May 23rd at 4:30pm.

A small number of releases of Guantanamo detainees have taken place. The way this is being presented by the Obama administration, and covered in the media, distorts what is really happening, and the whole meaning of Guantanamo. The administration evades the fact that only 8 of the remaining 155 men at Guantanamo were ever charged with a crime, and that certainly the rest should never have been there at Guantanamo in the first place.

Jan 11, 2013 marks 11 years since US detention center at Guantanamo was opened. Over 700 men have been released while some remain detained despite being cleared for release.

A recent federal court ruling granted the CIA the authority to withhold information regarding waterboarding and torture techniques used against detainees.

Aymen Abdel Halim, the communications coordinator for Chicago's Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), described the bill as a violation of citizens' constitutional and civil rights. "This is kind of a widespread action against all Americans," he said. "What we are seeing is a continued erosion of our civil liberties."

"It is outrageous and very sad that a representative of the people would partake in an attack against a global faith," said Ahmed Rehab, a spokesman for the Chicago office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "He could have said, 'a savage ideology' or 'a savage interpretation' or any type of nuance that a politician like himself knows how to do."