Demand Progress is urging all Representatives to cosponsor the concurrent War Powers Resolution just introduced by Representatives DeFazio, Biggs, Dingell, Gaetz, Castro, Rooney, Khanna, and Pocan. H.Con.Res. 123 would end U.S. participation in the Saudi-led war in Yemen and reassert Congress’s sole authority to declare war.
This War Powers Resolution has already been endorsed by organizations from across the political spectrum, including: Demand Progress, FreedomWorks, Just Foreign Policy, Concerned Veterans for America, the Friends Committee on National Legislation, BringOurTroopsHome.US, Peace Action, Committee for Responsible Foreign Policy, Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation, Yemeni Alliance Committee, the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, Action Corps, and Churches for Middle East Peace.
This bipartisan effort comes as Gulf regimes and the State Department threaten to exacerbate the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, including by potentially designating Houthis as a “foreign terrorist organization.” After more than five years of air strikes and blockades, 14 million Yemenis are on the brink of famine, while the U.N. special envoy for Yemen is scrambling to stop the United States from further stoking this war — a war Congress has already made clear the United States should not be engaged in.
Passage of this War Powers Resolution will further strengthen Congress’s reassertion of its sole power to declare war and will put significant pressure on all parties to reach a negotiated settlement, rather than continuing support for a prolonged effort to starve the Yemeni people into submission. As director of the Brookings Intelligence Project Bruce Riedel has said: “if the United States of America and the United Kingdom tonight told King Salman that this war has to end, it would end tomorrow.”
Congress not only has the authority to end U.S. participation in this war as well, it has the sole power to authorize our participation in the first place — authorization the executive branch has not received. Accordingly, Demand Progress is urging all Representatives to cosponsor this legislation and support its quick consideration on the floor.