S. 1790

Floor Speech

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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, tomorrow this body faces an opportunity, in fact, an obligation to reassert its proper constitutional role in warmaking.

I urge my colleagues to support the Udall-Kaine amendment, a provision to prohibit funding for unauthorized and unapproved military operations against Iran. No vote will be more important during this session than the one we cast tomorrow. It is not only the imminence of potential conflict, it is the reality that we would be surrendering our proper constitutional responsibility and our right if we fail to adopt this amendment. The American people already believe we have ceded too much authority to the executive branch; that we are implicitly, if not directly and explicitly, approving an imperial presence. This amendment puts us to the test before the American people.

The Congress has a job to do. We should do that job tomorrow. We should insist that we have the authority and we have the obligation to consider whether there are military operations against Iran.

We can talk about policy. There is no question that Iran is a malign and treacherously bad actor in that part of the world. There is no doubt that it poses a clear and present jeopardy to the world community. Iran may well have installed mines on the two tankers that were severely damaged recently and may well be the culprit in shooting down an American drone in the past week, but the United States is on a perilous course. We are on a dangerous course toward continued escalation and possible miscalculation that may create a spiral of uncontrollable military responses.

It isn't that we have a dangerous policy, it is that we have no policy, no strategy, no endgame articulated by the President of the United States or anyone in this administration. To resort to military action rather than reliance on diplomatic approaches is a recipe for potential disaster.

This unintended escalation could result from more miscalculation or it could result from purposeful desire on one side or both sides among a small number of advisers or military leaders that there be a resort to kinetic activity, but we have, in the meantime, an opportunity to resort to diplomacy, to enlist our allies and partners. This situation is the result of our putting those allies, in part, in an extraordinarily difficult position.

The current tensions with Iran today are the direct result of President Trump's ill-conceived policy toward Iran ever since he carelessly and recklessly discarded the Iran nuclear deal last year. His approach to foreign policy has been indecisive and chaotic, and that is partly the reason why tensions have escalated with an adversary rather than preserving key nuclear agreements and engaging in diplomacy.

We must now deescalate and resort to diplomacy. Even if one disagrees with that point, puts aside the President's bellicose and bullying rhetoric, and even if there is the thought that Iran is solely and completely responsible for this situation, the United States should not engage in military operations without the authorization of Congress. Yes, it may defend against or deter an immediate attack that is so urgent that defense of the country has to be undertaken by the Commander in Chief. But this Senate should prevent the President from entering and starting and engaging in another war in the Middle East under the misguided idea that there is a 2001 authorization that allows him to do so legally.

Let me be perfectly clear. A failure of the prohibition funding amendment we will consider tomorrow is not itself an authorization for the President to wage war with Iran. The Constitution trumps any statute. The Constitution requires action by Congress. Without congressional authorization and anything short of specific authority for declaration of war from Congress, starting or waging a war with Iran would be unconstitutional.

But the NDAA on the floor this week is an opportune time--in fact, a perfect opportunity--for Congress to reassert its constitutional authority over the role of the declaration of war. We must seize this moment. We can't simply allow or rely on the outdated 2001 authorization for the use of military force. We cannot allow its intent to be so distorted and stretched and our constitutionally required oversight to be disregarded. We have an obligation to conduct oversight continually and push back on an administration that makes false claims to advance its warmongering agenda.

The NDAA we passed today gives us the authority to undertake our defense of the Nation.

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