The House will vote on a Libya-related resolution sponsored by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) next week. (AP Photo/The Seattle Times, Ken Lambert)The already-contentious congressional debate over the U.S. intervention in Libya is about to get even more heated.
The House will vote next week on a measure calling on President Obama to end U.S. military involvement in Libya, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s (R-Va.) office announced Friday evening. The measure, sponsored by liberal anti-war Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), cites the 1973 War Powers Resolution, which states that any military operation not previously authorized by Congress must be halted 60 days after the president notifies Congress about the mission. Pursuant to the War Powers Resolution, the Kucinich measure reads, Congress “directs the President to remove the United States Armed Forces from Libya by not later than the date that is 15 days after the date of the adoption of this concurrent resolution.” The bill, H.Con.Res. 51, is likely to be taken up in the latter half of next week, according to the scheduledistributed by Cantor’s office. As of June 1, the first day the measure might be up for debate, the United States will have been involved in the Libyan conflict for 72 days. Bipartisan discontent with the U.S. involvement in Libya bubbled up Thursday in votes on Libya-related amendments to a defense authorization bill. One amendment would ensure that no defense funds would go toward the U.S. mission; another would bar U.S. ground troops from being used in the operation. (The White House has said it will not deploy ground troops.) In the Senate, there remains bipartisan opposition to U.S. involvement in Libya, but the only legislation that appears to be on tap is a measure authored by Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) supporting “the limited use of military force” in Libya and calling on Obama to submit a report on U.S. policy objectives in the country. The Senate isn’t expected to take up that measure until early June, when it returns from a week-long recess. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Friday that he and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) had spoken with McCain about the legislation and that the upper chamber “would likely turn to such a resolution within a week or two after we get back.”
