Hayes on Obama's plan to close Gitmo: 'He's simply misrepresenting the facts'

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Is Obama misrepresenting the facts about Gitmo?

Reaction from the 'Special Report' All-Star panel

The Weekly Standard’s Steve Hayes told viewers Tuesday on “Special Report with Bret Baier” that President Obama’s proposal to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is an attempt to follow through on a campaign promise, adding that he is misleading the American public in his attempt to sell the plan.

“Barack Obama is a longtime ideologue who wants to make good on his campaign promise to close Guantanamo,” Hayes said. “But in order to do that, he's simply misrepresenting the facts.”

Hayes cited the White House’s argument that the detention facility is a major tool for jihadist recruitment.

“It is not. You can ask experts from across the political spectrum. It's not a major recruitment tool for ISIS, [and] for Al Qaeda,” Hayes said, adding, “The president wants people to believe this because he wants to suggest that there's some national security imperative to closing it.”

“We've already seen [terrorists’] recidivism rates at or above 30 percent. This is a disastrous policy, and there's one explanation for the president doing it, and it's his ideology,” he concluded.