Ash Carter: Closing Guantanamo Bay 'would be a good thing'

By Sarah Westwood, Sarah Westwood

Published January 24, 2016

Secretary of Defense Ash Carter said Sunday he supports closing the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, but noted doing so would mean transferring certain prisoners to a new facility somewhere on U.S. soil.

"I've said from the day I was nominated to be secretary of defense I think, on balance, it would be a good thing to close Gitmo," Carter said during an appearance on CNN's "GPS with Fareed Zakaria."

"There are people in Gitmo who are so dangerous that we cannot transfer them to the custody of another government, no matter how much we trust that government," Carter said.

"The reality is, this portion of the Gitmo population has to be incarcerated somewhere," he said, later admitting "it would have to be in the United States."