The Biden Defense Department has reached a plea deal with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on the United States, and two other 9/11 terrorists (Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin Attash and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi) who provided assistance to the 19 men who attacked the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and who crashed the plane headed for the nation’s capital, that saves them from the death penalty.

The families of 9/11 victims and Republican legislators decried the move as a demonstration of “weakness” and “cowardice in the face of terror,” and a “national disgrace.” (READ MORE from Francis P. Sempa: Even More Echoes of 1968)

Senator Lindsey Graham accused the Biden-Harris administration of becoming a “doormat for thugs and terrorists.” Sen. Ted Cruz called it a “disgrace” and a “complete and total miscarriage of justice.” Sen. Mitch McConnell called the plea deal “a revolting abdication of the government’s responsibility to defend America and provide justice.”

A retired NYPD officer whose wife was killed in the attacks, remarked, “The … families have waited for 23 years to have our day in court to put on the record what these animals did to our loved ones” and “they took that opportunity away from us.” The NYPD and New York firefighters feel “betrayed” by their own government.

The murderers of nearly 3,000 people will serve life in prison. This, perhaps, is the final nail in the coffin of the Global War on Terror, which has ended with a humiliating American defeat in Afghanistan and now an unjust plea deal for 9/11 murderers — both courtesy of the Biden administration.

President George W. Bush famously shouted among the ruins of the World Trade Center that the people who knocked down those buildings will hear from all of us. Indeed, they have. The Taliban who provided a base and refuge for Al Qaeda are back in power in Afghanistan, and the mastermind and accomplices of the 19 Islamic hijackers have avoided the just punishment of the death penalty for their role in the murderous attacks.

A spokesperson reportedly said that the president and the White House played no role in the process. Perhaps. But as Harry Truman said, the buck stops there.

A Biden spokesperson in September 2023 stated that the administration was “committed to ensuring that the military commissions process is fair and delivers justice to the victims, survivors, families, and those accused of crimes.” The plea deal doesn’t do any of that. The American Civil Liberties Union, however, praised the government’s decision as the “right call.” If the ACLU is for it, it can’t be good.

Appeasing Murder

Opponents of the death penalty will now rightly argue that if the masterminds of the 9/11 murders of nearly 3,000 people didn’t get the death penalty, no one should. And terrorists throughout the world have seen again the fecklessness and feebleness of a far-left U.S. administration that is run by Obama holdovers who prided themselves on apologizing for past American sins against the Islamic world. Perhaps they believe that this is part of our penance for those sins.

We have reached an awful milestone, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, where the terrible words have been pronounced against us: “Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting.”

Three men who masterminded and assisted the murder of 2,976 people on American soil will now spend their remaining years in prison at American taxpayers’ expense. The very families who lost loved ones will be made to help pay for the murderers’ prison stays. Whoever signed-off on this plea deal should hang their heads in shame. Those who have waited 23 years for justice have been betrayed by their own government. (READ MORE: Trump’s Teddy Roosevelt Moment)

An NPR reporter suggested that “the Pentagon was motivated by the possibility of a Trump presidency because if Trump was elected, its very likely there would be no plea deal.” Something tells me we will shortly hear what the former president thinks of this deal.