Rand Paul: GOP can grow base by opposing indefinite detention

Sen. Rand Paul says that one of the ways he can bring more minority and younger voters into the party is to push back against indefinite detention.

Speaking with Bloomberg Businessweek, Mr. Paul, a likely 2016 presidential candidate, said this week that young blacks and Hispanics have a sense of justice and often mistrust government.

“So one of the big issues that I’ve fought here is getting rid of the provision called indefinite detention,” the Kentucky Republican said. “This is the idea that an American citizen could be accused of a crime, held indefinitely without charge, and actually sent from America to Guantanamo Bay and kept forever. I think there is something in that message of justice and a right to a trial by jury and a right to a lawyer that resonate beyond the traditional Republican Party and will help us to grow the Republican Party with the youth.”

Mr. Paul has argued that his libertarian brand of politics can help the GOP reach out to young voters and minorities who have supported Democrats in recent elections.

He has stopped short of calling for the closure of the controversial prison in Cuba, but has railed against locking up U.S. citizens on American soil without a trial.

As part of his effort to expand the GOP, Mr. Paul spoke this year at Howard University in Washington, D.C., and Simmons College in Louisville, where he urged blacks to give the GOP another look, while touting his opposition to military adventurism and desire to reduce sentences for non-violent drug possession

“We should stand and loudly proclaim enough is enough,” Mr. Paul said at Howard. “We should not have laws that ruin the lives of young men and women who have committed no violence. That’s why I have introduced a bill to repeal federal mandatory minimum sentences. We should not have drug laws or a court system that disproportionately punishes the black community.”