Source: ITP
Families who lost loved ones on September 11 are angry over the news that the Obama Administration has intervened to prevent alleged Saudi terror financiers from lawsuits. On May 29 - just five days before President Obama made his first state visit to Saudi Arabia - Solicitor General Elena Kagan filed a brief arguing that it would be "unwarranted" for the Supreme Court to hear cases brought by the families against five of Saudi King Abdullah's closest relatives for financing the attacks. The group, named the 9/11 Families United to Bankrupt Terrorism, charges that "five Saudi princes knowingly and intentionally provided financial support to al Qaeda waging war on America."
"By urging the high court to not review lower court decisions dismissing these these cases, the Obama Administration took the side of the Saudi princes over thousands of family members and survivors of the 9/ll attacks seeking justice and accountability in U.S. courts," the families said in a statement issued May 29.
They issued a second statement June 3, the day President Obama visited Saudi Arabia. It pointedly criticized the government as standing in the way of further investigation into 9/11:
"The Administration's filing mocks our system of justice and strikes a blow against the public's right to know the facts about who financed and supported the murder of 3,000 innocent people. It undermines our fight against terrorism and suggests a green light to terrorist sympathizers the world over that they can send money to al Qaeda without having to worry that they will be held accountable in the U.S. Courts for the atrocities that result."
Mike Low of Batesville, Ark., lost his daughter Sara on September 11. She was an American Airlines flight attendant who died on Flight 11, which slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Low called the administration's decision to urge the Supreme Court not to hear the case "a betrayal of our fundamentally American right to have our day in court." The move "sacrifices the principles of justice" in order to accommodate the political pleadings of a foreign government on behalf of a handful of members of its monarchy," he said.
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