Vice President Kamala Harris has beefed up her presidential campaign team by adding her brother-in-law, Tony West, Axios reported this week.
West, 58, who is married to Harris’ sister Maya, will serve as a "powerful adviser" according to the outlet. He previously worked as an attorney for the San Francisco-based law firm Morrison & Foerster, where he defended "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh, according to the Washington Free Beacon.
Lindh was captured in Afghanistan in 2001 and indicted on 10 counts, including charges of conspiring to kill fellow Americans.
"He is not a terrorist," West told the Washington Post in 2002, adding, "He did not go to Afghanistan to kill Americans."
Lindh accepted a plea deal in 2002 in which he admitted to supplying services to the Taliban and carrying a rifle and two hand grenades while fighting against the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance.
Upon his sentencing, Lindh apologized for fighting with the Taliban, saying, "had I realized then what I know now - I would never would have joined them."
Lind, a Northern California native who was 21 at the time, said Osama bin Laden is against Islam and that he "never understood jihad to mean anti-American or terrorism." He was released from prison in May of 2019 after serving 17 years of a 20-year sentence.
West had also previously served in high level positions with PepsiCo and Uber. His assignment in the Harris campaign has caused concern from party insiders, although not for representing Lindh. A Democratic official told Axios that West’s "prominent role could re-create the same family dynamics that at times caused unnecessary drama in her 2020 campaign."
The Washington Free Beacon noted that West’s time in the Department of Justice — he also worked as an attorney for the Obama administration — helped expand the legal privileges afforded to enemy combatants captured on the battlefield.
"Courts must have the procedural tools that enable them to conduct meaningful reviews of the lawfulness of the government’s action," West said during a 2011 speech to the American Bar Association. "Additionally, detainees must have fulsome procedures that allow them to test the legality of their detention."
Earlier in the week, the Biden Administration struck a plea deal with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and two of his accomplices held at the Guantanamo Bay prison when he agreed to plead guilty to masterminding the September 11, 2001, attacks in exchange for a life sentence. Late Friday evening, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin overrode that decision.
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