What DeSantis did at Guantánamo Bay
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 17 April 2023
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When Ron DeSantis first ran for governor in Florida in 2018, a campaign ad boasted that he “dealt with terrorists in Guantánamo Bay.” Today on "Post Reports," our reporter digs in on everything we can learn about that time.
Read more;
Florida governor and potential 2024 candidate Ron DeSantis is in the news a lot. But little is known about his time serving as a Navy lawyer at Guantánamo Bay.
Today on “Post Reports,” political investigative reporter Michael Kranish tells us everything he could learn about a pivotal and violent year at the prison, and DeSantis’s role during it.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | My name is Ahmed Abdel Aziz. |
| 0:07.4 | I was transferred to the island Guantanamo Bay on October 27, 2002. |
| 0:17.4 | Ahmed Abdel Aziz was a detainee for 13 years at Guantanamo Bay, one of the most controversial |
| 0:23.7 | prisons ever created. |
| 0:25.6 | The US set up the prison in the wake of 9-11 to hold terrorists, but we now know that many |
| 0:30.9 | of the people held there were never charged, and prisoners have alleged they suffered torture |
| 0:36.1 | and human rights abuses. |
| 0:39.0 | Independent groups, including the UN Commission on Human Rights, have denounced their treatment. |
| 0:45.2 | Ahmed arrived soon after the prison opened, when the prison was using highly controversial |
| 0:50.2 | and interrogation tactics, and force-feeding inmates who were on a hunger strike. |
| 0:55.2 | They were like doing the first feeding, and it wasn't just the first feeding. |
| 1:00.4 | They put all detainee on punishment for 90 days. |
| 1:06.2 | You know, you have nothing. |
| 1:08.4 | They will strip everything you have. |
| 1:13.6 | Everything you cannot imagine. |
| 1:15.2 | You have no blanket, no sheet, no towers, no toothbrush, nothing, no soap, even. |
| 1:25.1 | And this guy was working there, and he was one of these guys coming in them every day. |
| 1:31.5 | That guy he's talking about, who was working at Guantanamo Bay, was none other than Florida |
| 1:36.8 | Governor Ron DeSantis, the guy who is widely expected to announce he's running for president |
| 1:42.3 | in 2024. |
| 1:44.0 | DeSantis started working in the prison in 2006, and even though the Florida Governor seems |
| 1:49.8 | to be all over the news these days, very little is known about the time he spent working |
... |
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