If I were in charge of anything in our nation’s fair capital right now, I’d be checking in with Rep. Andy Biggs about “war powers reform” in the context of the struggle over who the next Speaker of the House will be and the parallel struggle over reforming the current endless-war-oligarch-oiled Bipartisan Stalinist rules of the U.S. House of Representatives on unconstitutional war previously imposed by outgoing endless-war-oligarch-oiled House Stalinist-in-Chief Nancy Pelosi.
Of course, when I say, “war powers reform,” what I mean is “enforcing Article I of the U.S. Constitution and the War Powers Resolution of 1973, whose crucial punchline is that the President of the United States can’t take America to war without the explicit prior authorization of the United States Congress.” Which enforcement we have not yet succeeded in completing with respect to ongoing unconstitutional U.S. participation in the Saudi blockade-genocide in Yemen, begun by President “Constitutional law professor” Obama without Congressional authorization in March 2015, escalated enthusiastically by President “more pro-Saudi than thou” Trump, and opaquely and mysteriously “announced the end of but not really” by President Biden.
A key idea of the War Powers Resolution of 1973 is that a single Member of Congress can call the question at any time - can move to force a floor vote whenever Congress is in session - on U.S. participation in a war that Congress has never authorized and which is therefore unconstitutional under Article I and the War Powers Resolution of 1973.
As Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi worked assiduously to effectively eviscerate this crucial reform with respect to the House on behalf of her pro-endless-war oligarch donors, a key reason, perhaps THE key reason, why we haven’t been able to end the Yemen war yet. This is a topic on which I could speak extemporaneously for longer than Bernie Sanders or Rand Paul could hold the Senate floor before they abolished the talking filibuster. But let us focus on one key example which is apparently still quite relevant to the juncture.
During the height of Covid-19 pandemic lockdown measures, Pelosi “turned off the ‘war powers clock’” in the House. Under the War Powers Resolution of 1973 and the pre-Pelosi rules of the House, any Member of the House could call the question on an unconstitutional war by introducing a concurrent War Powers Resolution to end U.S. participation in the war. Such a resolution was “privileged.” The sponsor could force a floor vote without the permission of the endless-war-Speaker-Oligarch-controlled House Foreign Affairs Committee. Nancy Pelosi used Covid as an excuse to shut down this mechanism. “It’s an emergency, we need special procedures.” But then when the House “returned to normal” as far as anyone could tell, the “War Powers clock” in the House was never turned back on - a concurrent War Powers Resolution still was no longer “privileged” and could not force a vote. I know, it’s shocking that a one-way express lane to increased bipartisan oligarch-financed Stalinism on unconstitutional war is happening in this establishment.
Here’s why Andy Biggs is potentially a very interesting person to check in on this with right now:
1. He’s a central character in the drama of House conservatives opposed to Kevin McCarthy as Speaker.
2. The conversation isn’t just about Kevin McCarthy. It’s about House rules imposed by Pelosi that McCarthy wants to continue that concentrate power in the Speaker’s office at the expense of rank-and-file Members who aren’t in the Speaker’s little oligarch-financed clique - a dynamic that the War Powers Resolution of 1973 was explicitly designed to provide tools for attacking so unconstitutional wars couldn’t go on and on without anybody being able to effectively challenge them.
3. Andy Biggs has a track record of being a War Powers Champion. Last May, he was an original co-sponsor of the Yemen War Powers Resolution in the House.
From the point of view of enforcing Article I and the War Powers Resolution of 1973, “divided government” is “a whole new ballgame.” The “Overton Window” for getting “Democratic priorities” through the House may have shrunk considerably. But War Powers Club is Bipartisan. We work with Leftists AND Libertarians.