After the Trump Administration’s 75-minute briefing to the US Senate on the assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) was deeply critical, calling it the worst briefing he’d gotten in his nine years in the Senate.
Saying the administration’s briefers offered little on the legal or practical justification for the attack, Sen. Lee particularly took umbrage at them warning the Senators that they must not debate the War Powers authorization for a war with Iran.
Those giving the briefing objected to the very idea of the Senate discussing the matter publicly, saying it would “embolden Iran.” Sen. Lee noted that this is a power Constitutionally reserved explicitly for the legislature.
Not only did Lee express annoyance that there was no pushback from any of the briefers on telling the Senate not to debate something legally in their purview, but he said that while he’d had problems with the language of Sen. Tim Kaine’s (D-VA) resolution, he has now decided that he will support the resolution, on condition of some amendments.
Lee greatly respects Trumps state terrorism though. Drone murders, attacking Syria for lies,constant glorification of militarization, massive US military spending, political state assassination of General Soleimani, arms to Saudi’s, murdering Palestinians, militarizing the US southern border.
Yeah Trump is a real 4D chess player against the deep state /s
Or so the Trump cult members would have you believe.
Pre-emptive military action is illegal in most cases because in most cases it is found to be unjustified. America doesn’t turn the other cheek, nor should we. We used to be able to take the first slap.
Now we fear blowback like we deserve it. Cowards desire a world without risk. They forget risk = reward. Freedom is not safe.
“Wednesday’s briefers, Defense Secretary Mark Esper, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, CIA director Gina Haspel, and Gen. Mark Milley, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”
Now, how could anyone question anything these wonderful people had to say? Talk about the cream of the crop. Three years in and the swamp in not only still not drained but has somehow managed to have been replaced with a cesspool. A sh*t swamp if you will.
Love that the Pentagon is telling Congress if they can do their delegated duty… Spineless pricks need to do more than one impeachment
He protests, then caves. Typical for the spineless Legislative branch. They should de-fang the Presidency immediately.
It’s hard to have a substantive briefing on imminence or practical and legal justification where none of it exists.
Senators Lee and Paul are on point here. But these justification came from Iran.
These justifications are supposed to come from the Executive Office to Congress before military action or, at least, soon after if an attack is imminent.
Imminence is not there when the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says of the base intelligence: “Did it exactly say who, what, when, where? No” -https://taskandpurpose.com/milley-evidence-imminent-iran-attack
Practical justification is not there when no one can explain how killing Soleimani stops whatever plan may have been discussed and makes future attacks by Iran more likely.
Legal justification is not there when Senators are told they must accept the EO’s authority based on a 17 yr old AUMF – without debate.
Seems the only argument being made by the President, his staff and Congressional cheerleaders is that Soleimani is responsible for the death of an American contractor – when the attackers have yet to be identified – and that he is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of US service men and women by providing EFPs and EIDs to Iraq when the Pentagon has yet to show that this is true and, in fact, the evidence indicates these weapons came from Iraqi machine shops.
So no. The President has yet to justify the attack, nor has anyone else. It’s a mockery.
There is a very good Washington Post article on January 7, 2020 by Nancy LeTourneau, titled “Pompeo Aligns U.S. Foreign Policy with Christian Zionists.” This should have been brought out in the briefing. This is what is driving our foreign policy in the Middle East.
It is literally their job to debate war authorizations.
this so called war authorization with no end date and no defined enemy, is void for vagueness and is completely unconstitutional to begin with. Congress HAS NO AUTHORITY TO DELEGATE IT’S AUTHORITY! but did it ILLEGALLY anyway..
Eisner v. Macomber, 252 U.S. 189 Congress … cannot by legislation alter the Constitution, from which alone it derives its power to legislate, and within whose limitations alone that power can be lawfully exercised.
United States Supreme Court EX PARTE SIEBOLD An unconstitutional law is void, and is as no law.
I watched the video where Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) was articulate. He found the briefing Insulting to all Senators (what he called the ‘Office of the Senate’). TimeStamp 4:21 on the video is where his passions heat up.