House Votes To Repeal The 2002 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) In Iraq

The House voted Thursday to repeal the 2002 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) passed to give legal backing for the Iraq War with the support of Democrats, Republicans and the White House — an unprecedented coalition to end post- 9/11 authorities to engage in hostilities that critics argue are outdated.

The Washington Post reports, House votes to repeal 2002 authorization for military force with strong bipartisan support and a White House endorsement:

The 268-to-161 vote reflects growing bipartisan support for the repeal effort, and tees up the legislation for the Senate, where Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) this week declared his support for the measure and his intention to bring it to the floor for a vote sometime this year.

Arizona Congressional Delegation: All but Rep. Debbie Lesko voted for repeal. I have not seen any explanation for her vote.

“Today’s historic vote is a turning point,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Gregory W. Meeks (D-N.Y.) said on the floor just before the vote. “I look forward to Congress no longer taking a back seat on some of the most consequential decisions our nation can make.”

Congress, however, is still largely divided along party lines about whether the move to repeal such authorizations will actually allow lawmakers to reclaim their power to permit the use of military force — a decision that some think has been usurped by successive presidents.

Lawmakers have been trying for almost a decade to repeal both the 2002 Authorization for the Use of Military Force [in Iraq] as well as the 2001 AUMF that Congress passed to greenlight hostilities against the perpetrators of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Both the Obama and Trump administrations opposed the repeal measures.

People in both parties argued that the authorizations had been stretched beyond recognition to target terrorist groups that didn’t even exist when the approvals were granted, while different presidents insisted that they needed the latitude to adapt to a changing threat landscape.

When President Biden entered office, he indicated that he was willing to work with lawmakers to wind down authorizations. For the past several months, his administration has been negotiating with leading proponents of repeal to determine the way forward.

The 2002 authorization is generally viewed as the simplest of AUMFs to phase out. The Iraq War was formally ended years ago, and the military has not cited the permissions granted in 2002 as its sole justification for any operations in more than a decade.

Still, many lawmakers — most of them Republicans — have rejected the idea of winding down the existing AUMFs without having replacements prepared to address “the modern-day threat.”

“We need to replace this with an updated AUMF that reflects the threats in the region, the current threats, which is Iran,” Rep. Michael McCaul (Tex.), the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said on the floor just before the vote.

But Democrats rejected his argument.

“If we think Iran is a threat, maybe we should do an AUMF for Iran . . . this AUMF is for Iraq,” Meeks said. “There’s no need to repeal and replace, they are outdated, and once they’re outdated, let’s just remove them from the books.”

Some Republicans agreed. “Three presidents, both Republicans and Democrats, have used this permission to drag out conflicts that will get us into new ones,” Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) said on the floor.

The bill heads to the Senate, where the GOP will be split over whether to support it. CNBC House votes to repeal 2002 Iraq War authorization as Senate prepares to take action:

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee plans to move forward next week with its own plan to revoke the Authorization for Use of Military Force.

President Joe Biden supports the House bill to repeal the Iraq War authorization. His Office of Management and Budget said this week that “the United States has no ongoing military activities that rely solely on the 2002 AUMF as a domestic legal basis, and repeal of the 2002 AUMF would likely have minimal impact on current military operations.”

Lawmakers from both parties have worried that leaving the authorization in place will give presidents a legal backstop to justify unrelated military strikes. The Iraq War ended nearly a decade ago.

The House previously voted in January 2020 to repeal the measure after the U.S. launched an airstrike in Iraq that killed Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani. The Senate, then held by Republicans, did not pass the bill. The Trump administration cited the authorization measure as the legal basis for the airstrike.

Ah, there it is. Republicans want to keep using the AUMF for the Iraq War – which ended a decade ago – to go to war with Iran. “Iraq, Iran, what’s the diff?” Still harboring PNAC’s wet dream of a Pax Americana Empire in the Middle East. The refrain “boys go to Baghdad, but real men go to Tehran” gained circulation within neoconservative circles. The GQP is the “Forever War” party.

Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., led the legislation the House passed Thursday. A longtime antiwar advocate, Lee was the only House member to vote against the 2001 war authorization in Afghanistan.

“This authority remains on the books, vulnerable to misuse because the Congress has not acted to remove it,” Lee said on the House floor Thursday.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Wednesday he wants to hold a vote on revoking the Iraq authorization this year. He said scrapping the authorization will “eliminate the danger of a future administration reaching back into the legal dustbin to use it as a justification for military adventurism.”

Wait for it …

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., signaled Thursday he would oppose repealing the war authorization despite some support for doing so within his caucus.

“The fact of the matter is, the legal and practical application of the 2002 AUMF extends far beyond the defeat of Saddam Hussein’s regime,” he said. “Tossing it aside without answering real questions about our own efforts in the region is reckless.”

Sens. Tim Kaine, D-Va., and Todd Young, R-Ind., have led the bipartisan effort to revoke the measure in the Senate.

The 18-year-old Iraq War authorization is obsolete. The Government of Iraq is now a partner—not an enemy—so the House’s vote to repeal it is both welcome and overdue. Time for the Senate to follow suit and put the 2002 AUMF to rest before a future president wreaks havoc with it. https://t.co/NrIZfKJq5G

— Tim Kaine (@timkaine) June 17, 2021