By Michael Ventura
DNAinfo Senior Editor
MANHATTAN — Lower Manhattan is still in the running to host the trials of accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told Congress on Wednesday.
During testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Holder said the Obama administration would consider the public outcry against holding the trials downtown raised by local politicians and community members who don't want their neighborhood locked down by police barricades.
But a trial in New York is "not off the table," Holder said.
“The Southern District of New York, for instance, is a much larger place than simply Manhattan,” Holder said, the New York Times reported. “There’s also the possibility of trying the case in other venues beyond New York.”
Holder said the administration would decide in a few weeks on a venue for the trials of Mohammed and four others accused of conspiring to launch the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center.
Sen. Charles Schumer reiterated the city's wide opposition to hosting the terror trials.
"We know the administration is not going to hold the trial in New York," Schumer told the Daily News. "They should just say it already."
