Partisan lines blur as Congress tries to curb Biden’s war powers

“We’ve come a long way, but we have a long way to go,” said Lee, whose bill to repeal the 2002 authorization for the use of military force in Iraq will get a vote in the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday.

“We’ve been building support over the years for this moment. I think the public has said very clearly that they’re tired of ‘forever wars,’ and that Congress needs to re-engage and do its job. Because we have been missing in action.”

Lee’s measure is expected to receive widespread bipartisan support and is likely to get a vote on the House floor soon, boosted by a recent White House statement indicating that President Joe Biden is open to the effort. But it’s an entirely different question in the Senate, where the filibuster could allow the chamber’s hawks to block it.

“The terrorism threats that underlie those authorizations are still there,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a top Foreign Relations Committee member, said in a brief interview. “There’s clearly terrorist activity inside of Iraq.”

Already, there is momentum for a push by Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Todd Young (R-Ind.) to repeal the 2002 and 1991 authorizations, both of which pertained to Iraq, after Biden formally backed a new war powers vote in Congress. But that effort is just the lowest-hanging fruit for proponents of reforms.

Addressing the post-9/11 authorization, approved in the days following the terror attacks, will be an entirely different story. That broad measure has been used as a legal justification for military operations and drone strikes throughout the Middle East and northern Africa by presidents of both parties. Replacing the 2001 authorization to better reflect the threat environment is a gargantuan task, requiring a consensus between the Biden administration and the several competing factions on the Hill.

“I think we could get 60 votes to repeal 2002. It’s much more difficult to rewrite 2001,” said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), who has been active on the war powers front. “And again, we really need buy-in from the administration to help us do that. … It may be that we just need to start exercising this muscle first.”

Indeed, Senate Democratic leaders have already indicated that they plan to address the Iraq authorizations separate from the 2001 measure. Kaine said he is already working “constructively” with the White House on revisions to the 2001 authorization, noting: “This is the first White House, of the three I’ve worked with, that is like, ‘We really want to engage in this discussion.’”

House Democrats have voted to repeal both the 2001 and 2002 war measures as part of wider defense policy and funding legislation since taking over the majority in 2019 — with progressive Democrats proposing to wind down the 2001 authorization over the course of several months to give Congress and the White House time to pass a replacement. Those attempts came up flat amid opposition from the Trump administration and a then-GOP-led Senate.

‘It’s going to be challenging’

Although Biden…