March 25, 2021

Congress looks to Biden as an ally as it tries to finally rewrite authority for the war on terror

Source: CNN

Journalists: Jeremy Herb, Phil Mattingly

There's a new movement afoot to finally curb the President's 9/11 war powers, and the Republicans and Democrats pushing it have hope in a key ally: the President himself.

On the heels of President Joe Biden's military strikes in Syria, a bipartisan group of lawmakers thinks there's new momentum to finally replace those legal authorities, used to fight terrorism across the globe for nearly two decades.

It's a push that has been stalled for years, as congressional advocates of curbing the executive branch's war powers sought to rewrite the laws for more than a decade. But lawmakers say there are key reasons this time could be different: consensus is shifting to their side, they argue, as the 2001 and 2002 war authorizations drag on year after year, and they have an advocate they previously lacked -- a former Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman now sitting in the Oval Office.

Read the full story and more from CNN.

Author

  • Richard Fontaine

    Chief Executive Officer

    Richard Fontaine is the chief executive officer of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). He served as president of CNAS from 2012–19 and as senior fellow from 2009–12...