House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi says lawmakers are “overdue” on debating a new authorization for the use of military force against the Islamic State.
The California Democrat told Time that a new AUMF tops her list of priorities for 2016, in addition to the creation of a select committee on gun safety and legislation to reform the tax code.
“From the standpoint of our national security, we are so overdue for a reauthorization of use of military force,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi’s comments suggest that top leaders in the House are committed to debating the war against the Islamic State, which has stretched on for more than a year, even as leaders in the Senate say it’s better to put off debate until a new commander in chief takes office in 2017.
Speaker Paul Ryan also told reporters last week that he’d like to see Congress pass a new war authorization in the new year.
“It would be a good symbol of American resolve to have a new AUMF to go after ISIS, to thoroughly defeat and destroy ISIS,” Ryan said, according to Huffington Post.
Ryan said he’s asked Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., to set up “listening sessions” so lawmakers can say what they’d like to see in a new war authorization.
The Obama administration has justified military action against the Islamic State under two previous war authorizations from 2001 and 2002, which allowed military strikes against al Qaeda and affiliated groups, and military action within Iraq.
Lawmakers have criticized the president’s decision to lean on those authorizations, and say that those who voted for them never intended them to be used in the current conflict more than a decade later.
Earlier this month, a bipartisan group of lawmakers in the House and Senate introduced a new war authorization and urged Congress to hold a vote to show solidarity with troops risking their lives overseas.
“The fight against [ISIS] is just,” said Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., a lead advocate of the measure. “But it’s illegal.”
In February, the president sent his request for a war authorization to Capitol Hill, but was unable to get support from members of either party. Democrats said the proposal amounted to a blank check that could put American ground troops in combat, while Republicans said some limitations needlessly tied the president’s hands.
Congress held several hearings with administration witnesses on the measure, but never voted on it.
While there’s willingness among the House leadership to draft a new authorization and get lawmakers on the record on the war, Senate leaders say they will not take up an AUMF in the new year.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said anything passed in 2016 would govern the new president in 2017, who may have a different strategy to fight the Islamic State.
“We’re going to have a new president a year from now,” McConnell said in an interview with Roll Call. “He or she may have a different view about the way to deal with ISIS and that part of the world. I don’t think we ought to be passing an [authorization] as the president exits the stage when he already thinks he has the authority to do what he’s willing to do now.”
Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn. and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also said he wouldn’t bring up any proposed authorizations because none have the votes to pass.
