[Peace] Showdown: Tulsi Gabbard v. Steny Hoyer on unconstitutional war in Syria

[Robert Naiman]

Steny Hoyer is coming home to roost. This is who he at 3AM: a Warmonger, a
diehard devotee of unconstitutional war, a bagman for AIPAC and the
Pentagon-industrial complex. He may not be the Queen of the Warmongers, but
he's certainly a member of the Royal Family. Smoking him out is a victory.
I fear Hoyer at night more than I fear him in the daylight.

*Recall*:

HOUSE DEMOCRATIC WHIP RESISTS EFFORT TO END U.S. INVOLVEMENT IN YEMEN WAR
Lee Fang
*October 31 2017*, 7:00 a.m.
https://theintercept.com/2017/10/31/yemen-war-us-military-house-resolution/

============

And now this:

https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/12/democratic-leader-deals-blow-tulsi-gabbard-plan-syria-exit.html

Democratic leader pours cold water on Tulsi Gabbard’s bid to force Syria
withdrawal
Bryant Harris December 4, 2019

Presidential hopeful Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, could force a House vote next
week that would require President Donald Trump to withdraw the roughly
1,000 remaining US troops from Syria. But there’s just one problem — the
House’s No. 2 Democrat firmly opposes her effort.

“I intend to vote no,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told
Al-Monitor today. “We haven’t whipped this, but I think our members think
an immediate withdrawal would not be appropriate.”

Hoyer’s opposition, coupled with a lack of buy-in from some progressive
Democrats and anti-war groups, could significantly hamper Gabbard’s ability
to pass the legislation.

The 1973 War Powers Act allows any lawmaker to force a vote requiring the
president to withdraw troops from any conflicts not authorized by Congress.
The law allows Gabbard to call up a vote on the US troop posture in Syria
as soon as Dec. 11.

The resolution specifically takes aim
<https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-concurrent-resolution/77/text>
at
Trump’s stated goal of “leaving soldiers to secure the oil” in northeast
Syria. It would require Trump to withdraw all troops from Syria within two
months unless they are “engaged in operations directed at al-Qaeda or
associated forces.”

“President Trump’s deployment of US troops to secure Syrian oil fields that
do not belong to us, with talks of welcoming in private oil corporations to
take the oil, is unconstitutional and a violation of international law,”
Gabbard said in a statement last week.

Trump reversed course on a full withdrawal from northeast Syria in October,
redeploying some 900 troops to secure oil fields in the area and stating
that the United States “should be able to take some.” Shortly thereafter,
Defense Secretary Mark Esper told reporters that US troops would primarily
guard the oil fields from the Islamic State despite the territorial defeat
of the caliphate.

Gabbard, who is leaving Congress in 2021, centered her campaign around
opposition to what she labels "regime-change wars.” But she has also
developed a checkered reputation on Syria due to her past statements widely
viewed as supportive of President Bashar al-Assad.

This is her second stab at a Syria war powers bill, and negotiations over
the resolution’s final language remain ongoing.

She introduced a new version of the bill last week after an Al-Monitor
report
<https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/11/tulsi-gabbard-groundwork-force-vote-syria-withdrawal.html>
detailed
concerns about her initial bill that were raised by some key anti-war
groups. Still, several of the activists remain unsatisfied, arguing that
the current language could still be construed to authorize military action
against the Islamic State.

The resolution’s latest language tracks more closely with a Yemen war
powers resolution introduced by her 2020 presidential rival Sen. Bernie
Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif. Sanders and Khanna succeeded
in passing
<https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/contents/articles/originals/2019/03/senate-tie-trump-hands-war-powers-yemen.html>
that
resolution, which was intended to end US support for the Saudi-led
coalition in Yemen, but they did not have enough support to override
Trump’s veto in April.

Khanna struggled to get his Yemen war powers resolution passed when he
first introduced it in 2017. But the effort gained significant traction
after Hoyer and other Democratic leaders backed his legislation last year.

Nonetheless, even Khanna has not committed to voting for Gabbard’s
resolution, which still does not have any co-sponsors.

“I still have some concerns as to some of the groups, and we’re trying to
work it out,” Khanna told Al-Monitor.

However, the resolution does boast support from two of the dozens of
advocacy groups involved in the Yemen war powers push coalition: Just
Foreign Policy and Demand Progress.

“It should be an easy yes vote for anyone who believes in the US
Constitution and laws, which state that only Congress — not the president —
can authorize deployments of troops into harm’s way,” Erik Sperling, the
executive director for Just Foreign Policy, told Al-Monitor. “Congress has
clearly not authorized our forces to take Syria’s oil, which is illegal,
unconstitutional and extremely damaging to our nation’s image abroad.”
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