US Congress Vote to Halt US Aid to Saudi Arabia in Yemen War

In rebuke of Trump’s alliance with Saudi Arabia, resolution would force administration to withdraw US troops.

Ariana News Agency-

Asserting congressional authority over war-making powers, the US House of Representatives approved a resolution Wednesday that would force the Trump administration to withdraw US troops from involvement in Yemen, in a rebuke of Donald Trump’s alliance with the Saudi-led coalition behind the military intervention, according to The Guardian.

Lawmakers in both parties are increasingly uneasy over the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and are skeptical of the US partnership with that coalition, especially in light of Saudi Arabia’s role in the killing of the Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a critic of the royal family.

Passage of the measure would mark the first time Congress has relied on the decades-old War Powers Resolution to halt military intervention. It also would set up a potential confrontation with the White House, which has threatened a veto. The House voted 248-177 to approve the measure, sending it to the Senate, where a similar resolution passed last year.

“We have helped create, and worsen, the world’s largest humanitarian crisis,” said the California representative Barbara Lee, a Democrat, during the debate. “Our involvement in this war, quite frankly, is shameful.”

The chairman of the House foreign relations committee, Eliot Engel, a New York Democrat, said the vote represented “Congress reclaiming its role in foreign policy”.

Senate approval would set up a showdown with the administration – a veto would be Trump’s first – over the president’s shifting approach on foreign policy.