Military Trials for 9/11 Terror Suspects Backed by Big Majority

A substantial majority of voters oppose the Obama administration's insistence on trying 9/11 terror suspects in civilian rather than military courts and an even higher percentage believe that the man trained by al-Qaeda to blow up a U.S. airliner on Christmas Day should be charged as an enemy combatant rather than being a defendant in a criminal court, according to a Quinnipiac University poll conducted Feb. 2-8.

Fifty-nine percent say that the Sept. 11 suspects should be tried in military courts while 35 percent agree with the decision to try them in civilian courts, with 6 percent undecided. While Democrats are almost evenly divided on the question, 73 percent of Republicans and 61 percent of independents favor using military courts.

A Washington Post/ABC News poll, conducted Feb. 4-8 and also released today, asked the same question and found 55 percent favoring a military tribunal and 39 percent saying the trial should be held in the federal court system.

While the Obama administration is still pressing ahead with the criminal court trials, citing the successful trials of Zacarias Moussawi, the so-called 20th hijacker in the 9/11 attacks, and the terrorists who bombed the World Trade Center in 1993. But after a change of heart by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the administration agreed to move the trial of the Sept. 11 suspects to a venue other than downtown Manhattan.

The issue has become a political football, with Republicans arguing that suspects should face a military tribunal because their attacks were acts of war.

Sixty-eight percent in the Quinnipiac poll say the suspects in the trial should not get all the constitutional protections afforded in a civilian court. Eighty-three percent of Republicans held that view, as did 69 percent of independents. A smaller majority of Democrats (56 percent) agreed.

Seventy-six percent say that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 23-year-old Nigerian who had been equipped and trained by an al-Qaeda branch in Yemen to bomb a U.S. airliner, should be tried as an enemy combatant. That view was held by big majorities across partisan lines.

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