(RightWing.org) – Just six weeks into the Biden presidency, some senators think he’s already crossed the line on the use of military force. And now, they want to rein him in. A new bill introduced on Wednesday could strip the president of war powers, used to justify years of attacks on the Middle East.
On March 3, Senators Tim Kaine (D-VA) and Todd Young (R-IN) introduced a bill calling for the repeal of Authorizations for the Use of Military Force issued in 1991 and 2002. Both authorizations occurred to allow attacks against Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq. But Saddam has been dead for 14 years, and the current Iraqi government is a US ally. Now, Kaine says the authorizations leave the US on “a permanent war footing” and are being abused to launch strikes on other countries.
And they're introducing a bill to curb Biden's powers, one week after his surprise airstrike in Syria. https://t.co/biTJM68SXy
— Mic (@mic) March 3, 2021
Last week, Biden authorized airstrikes on targets in Syria, a powderkeg of competing factions backed by regional and even global powers that include Iran and Russia. Biden didn’t get approval from Congress before ordering the strikes, and, under the Constitution, the authority to wage war lies with Congress, not the president.
Kaine and Young say enough is enough, and it’s time to return the power to use America’s military to Congress. This isn’t the first attempt to repeal the authorizations, but with another Democrat president seemingly eager to re-engage in the Middle East’s perpetual wars, America needs this one to succeed.
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