Tales from the Trail

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder on Wednesday flew to New York to huddle with his team that will be in charge of prosecuting and imprisoning the five men accused of plotting the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

The closed-door meeting at the federal courthouse in downtown Manhattan included the prosecutors from the Southern District of New York and Eastern District of Virginia as well as representatives of the FBI, Bureau of Prisons, the Marshals Service, and the New York Police Department, according to an administration official.

A spokeswoman for Holder declined to provide details about the meeting. NBC News reported on Tuesday that a grand jury was hearing evidence against the self-professed mastermind of the attacks Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

The five men are not expected to arrive in New York until early next year at the earliest because first the Obama administration must give Congress 45 days advance notice about how they will secure the prisoners and address any security issues.

Holder has come under blistering criticism from Republicans for deciding to try the accused 9/11 conspirators in U.S. criminal court instead of a military court, arguing that they should not be brought to American soil from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

For those holding out hope that healthcare reform and climate change legislation would not squeeze out efforts to overhaul the broken U.S. immigration system this year, think again.

At the “Three Amigos Summit” in Guadalajara, Mexico, President Barack Obama all but ruled out legislation passing this year, particularly since his top initiative — healthcare — has been put off until September and there still remains work to be done on climate change. And, oh yes, fixing the U.S. financial regulatory system too.

“That’s a pretty big stack of bills,” Obama told reporters alongside Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. “I would anticipate that before the year is out, we will have draft (immigration) legislation, along with sponsors potentially in the House and the Senate who are ready to move this forward.”