President Barack Obama's 2008 promise to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay had another setback on Nov. 25 when he signed a law that makes it tougher to achieve his goal.

The National Defense Authorization Act prohibits the use of funds to close Gitmo. It also bans using funds to transfer or release detainees to the United States or to construct or modify facilities in the United States to house detainees from Gitmo. The administration had been crafting a plan to move at least some of the remaining captives to military prisons in the United States, potentially to Colorado, Kansas or South Carolina.

The law appears to make it impossible for Obama to close the facility where 107 captives remained as of Nov. 23.

In a statement when he signed the bill on the eve of Thanksgiving, Obama said that he was "deeply disappointed" that Congress failed to move toward closing the detention facility.

"The continued operation of this facility weakens our national security by draining resources, damaging our relationships with key allies and partners, and emboldening violent extremists. It is imperative that we take responsible steps to reduce the population at this facility to the greatest extent possible and close the facility. The population once held at Guantanamo has now been reduced by over 85 percent. Over the past 24 months alone, we have transferred 57 detainees, and our efforts to transfer additional detainees continue. It is long past time for the Congress to lift the restrictions it has imposed and to work with my Administration to responsibly and safely close the facility, bringing this chapter of our history to a close."

Earlier, on Oct. 22, Obama vetoed the bill because of the Guantanamo language and over a dispute about military funding. But after Obama signed off on a two-year budget deal, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said that Obama would sign the defense bill.

Earnest said that the administration still planned to send to Congress a "thoughtful, carefully considered plan for closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay, and a plan that we believe merits the strong support of both Democrats and Republicans in the Congress."

About a week before he signed the defense bill, Obama reiterated his promise to shut down Gitmo in remarks on Nov. 19:

"We can keep the American people safe while shutting down that operation. We've already reduced drastically the populations. Keep in mind that the bulk of people who are released from Guantanamo were done so under the previous administration, before I even came in. We have reduced that population further, and I expect that early by next year we may even have fewer than 100 people at Guantanamo. We are spending millions of dollars per detainee, and it's not necessary for us to keep our people safe.

So we are going to go through meticulously, with Congress, what our options are and why we think this should be closed. I guarantee you there will be strong resistance, because in the aftermath of Paris, I think that there is just a very strong tendency for us to get worked up around issues that don't actually make us safer but make for good political sound bites."

So is Obama out of options here?

Charles "Cully" Stimson, senior legal fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said by signing the defense bill, it makes it less likely that closing Gitmo will be done by a legislative route. Congress is unlikely to want to work with Obama -- particularly against the backdrop of the Paris attacks and ISIS.

Officials in his administration have discussed the possibility of using executive authority alone to close the detention camp. But legal experts are divided about whether that is possible.

However, that doesn't rule out what would essentially be closure by attrition.

"They are going to step up attrition," Stimson predicted. "If they step it up, they might get down to a very small number of people."

Naureen Shah, director of security and human rights at the U.S. section of Amnesty International, said that Obama still has options.

"There are a lot of detainees who would have been willing -- or are willing -- to take plea deals in U.S. courts without setting foot on U.S. soil," she said. That could lead to some of them ultimately getting released.

"He needs to get as many people out as possible before he leaves office -- it's a matter of whittling down the 107," she said.

This is one of the promises that we have rated at various times In the Works, Stalled and Broken. At times, it has appeared that Congress was easing its opposition. But by signing the defense bill, Obama has made it harder to achieve his promise. We still want to see what final actions he might take in his remaining 14 months in office before we settle on a final rating, but for now we continue to rate this promise Stalled.