Gingrich: Holder Should Resign For Handling Of Terrorism Cases

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is outraged that convicted terrorist Ahmed Ghailani was just acquitted in civilian court of all but one of the 286 charges against him.

"It's clear to me that Attorney General [Eric] Holder should resign," he tells Newsmax.TV in an exclusive interview. Gingrich was in Palm Beach, Fla. attending Restoration Weekend, a conservative conference organized by the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

Gingrich angrily denounced Holder's handling of this and other terror cases.


Ghailani, 36, the first ex-Guantanamo inmate to be tried in a civilian court, will still serve at least 20 years in jail and could be sentenced to life imprisonment after being found guilty of conspiracy against US property. But the New York jury cleared the Tanzanian national of all but one of 286 charges brought against him for the 1998 embassy bombings in Africa.

Gingrich blamed Holder for creating the conditions for Ghailani's legal victory.

"His rulings have been wrong. They've endangered our national security. They allowed a federal judge to throw out most of the evidence."

Terrorism cases shouldn't be tried in civilian courts, Gingrich says.

"This is a war," he adds.. "You can't bring into this kind of trial the kind of evidence a military tribunal would have."

The Obama administration refuses to admit we're in a war, he says.

"It's very dangerous to have an administration which refuses to deal with reality."

Gingrich doesn't think much of the new body scanners and pat-down procedures for air travelers.

"It's tragic that the Obama administration refuses to tell us the truth about our enemies, refuses to design a strategy to defeat them and instead believes inconveniencing, embarrassing, humiliating millions of innocent people is better than profiling and addressing intelligence," he says.

In sum, "This is a grotesque overreach of government," Gingrich says.

Gingrich also predicted a difficult time ahead as the new Republican House faces off against the Obama White House.      More here