Can the N.J. serial terrorist suspect be tried as an enemy combatant?

Questions and debates have been furiously swirling around how officials should ultimately handle charges against Ahmad Khan Rahami, an Afghani-born, U.S.-naturalized citizen who is accused of plotting for months and carrying out bomb attacks against New York and New Jersey citizens.

By default, the New Jersey resident can be protected under his constitutional rights as a citizen of the United States, while about 61 other suspected Islamic extremists are left in Guantanamo Bay, without constitutional privileges, who are arguably suspected of lessor offenses in the continued fight against terrorism.

“At some point, isn’t the punishment severe enough that, well, if you decide to join terrorism groups and try and kill Americans you kind of forfeit your status for rights,” Dana Loesch asked her guest Andrew McCarthy, former assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of N.Y., said on TheBlaze TV's Dana.

McCarthy said the Constitution itself makes it possible to hold an American citizen as a combatant:

And I even think it would be wise to hold the person as an enemy combatant and ultimately make the decision down the road whether you want to try him in a civilian court or military court. Because by holding the person as an enemy combatant under the laws of war, you don’t have to give him Miranda warnings; you don’t have to give him a lawyer. You can get the thing that’s most important in a lot of these situations, which is intelligence. And you can hold him for a long as he’s providing useful intelligence, which can be a very long time.

Watch Loesch and McCarthy take on this issue:

What do you think?