Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, must remain open after she recently toured the facility holding three of the 9/11 conspirators.

While the president is making a last-ditch effort to keep a campaign promise to shut down the prison, the majority of congressional members are against shutting the prison and transferring up to 53 of the 114 prisoners to federal lockup facilities.

“I’m not ready to expand their rights,” Capito said in an interview, explaining once the detainees are on U.S. soil they may qualify for rights guaranteed in the Constitution.

Later this year, a Defense Department team is slated to visit prisons where the suspected terrorists could be held, including the Colorado State Penitentiary in Canon City and the so-called Supermax federal prison in Florence, Colo.

The military team has already visited the Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., and the Naval Consolidated Brig in Charleston, S.C.

The detainees currently at Guantanamo are where they should be, Capito said. “It is the only place, the best place, the right place to house the remaining 114” detainees, she told reporters during a recent Capitol Hill press conference.

During her one-day visit in October, Capito toured the base, reviewed detention operations and met with troops, including a soldier serving at Gitmo from Martinsburg.

Capito discussed with soldiers a recent court order preventing female service members from performing their duties as guards for the “9/11 Five” after the suspected terrorist detainees complained. The 9/11 five, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, are charged with facilitating the Sept. 11 attack.

“After visiting Guantanamo for the first time and seeing firsthand the incredible character of the men and women serving at the detention facility, I am deeply concerned with a court order that prevents female service members from doing their jobs and serving in the same capacity as their male counterparts,” said Capito. “These women deserve better and should not be prevented from fully performing their duties simply because of a capitulation to the demands of terrorists.”

Earlier this year, a military judge issued an order prohibiting female guards from transporting the defendants after they refused to meet with defense lawyers and complained that any physical contact with unrelated women violated their Muslim beliefs.

The White House contends the facility can be closed only if the detainees are relocated to prisons in the U.S.

However, lawmakers are adamant on continuing the ban on transferring detainees to the U.S. until the end of next year.

The recent defense funding bill includes provisions that would make it harder for the president to transfer suspected terror detainees out of Gitmo and would prevent them from being transferred to U.S. soil. Obama, who was upset about those restrictive provisions, has vetoed the bill over a larger government spending fight with the GOP-led Congress.

On Thursday, the House voted overwhelmingly to approve the 2016 defense policy bill. The Senate should vote on it sometime this week.