From CNN:
Charles "Cully" Stimson, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, has proposed a boycott of law firms that represent Guantanamo Bay detainees:
The Pentagon on Saturday disavowed a senior official's remarks suggesting companies boycott law firms that represent detainees at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Charles "Cully" Stimson, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, said in a radio interview last week that companies might want to consider taking their business to firms that do not represent suspected terrorists.
Stimson's remarks were viewed by legal experts and advocacy groups as an attempt to intimidate law firms that provide legal help to all people, even unpopular defendants.
A Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Col. Brian Maka, said Stimson was not speaking for the Bush administration.
Stimson's comments "do not represent the views of the Department of Defense or the thinking of its leadership," Maka told The Associated Press on Saturday.
Stimson's "shameful and irresponsible" remarks deserve condemnation, said Neal Sonnett, a Miami lawyer and president of the American Judicature Society, a nonpartisan group of judges, lawyers and others.
Sonnett said in a statement that Stimson had made a "blatant attempt to intimidate lawyers and their firms who are rendering important public service in upholding the rule of law and our democratic ideals."
Stimson on Thursday told Federal News Radio, a local commercial station that covers the government, that he found it "shocking" that lawyers at many of the nation's top law firms represent detainees.
Stimson listed the names of more than a dozen major firms he suggested should be boycotted.
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