Phill Kline, former Kansas Attorney General and Liberty University law professor, said a resolution aimed at limiting the president’s ability to continue military operations in Iran without congressional approval that was rejected by the U.S. Senate on Wednesday was unlikely to change U.S. policy even if it had passed.
The measure, brought by U.S. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), failed by a 47-53 vote, falling short of advancing in the chamber. The proposal sought to restrict military action under the framework of the War Powers Resolution unless Congress explicitly authorized it.
“The War Powers Act was passed in light of the Vietnam War, and it really has been primarily applied in a symbolic manner,” Kline said during Thursday’s edition of The Michael Patrick Leahy Show. “The actions of Congress are very limited in what they can do to force the withdraw of troops or this action.”
Kline argued that the constitutional structure of the law effectively prevents Congress from forcing an end to military operations without a veto-proof majority.
“A joint resolution… is not going to happen,” he said. “And then the president, because of a recent Supreme Court decision, could veto that resolution and you’re never gonna get two thirds to override it.”
He continued, “So you have these symbolic actions that are being initiated by primarily Democrats in the House and the Senate, and it’s not going to result in a change of U.S. strategy.”
Kline also said a court challenge based on a passed resolution would likely fail due to precedent from the U.S. Supreme Court regarding legislative veto power.
“Unless it ignores Supreme Court precedent, it would say that this has no effect because the president would veto the resolution,” Kline said. “The Supreme Court has invalidated what is called a legislative veto, in which the legislature can say we will veto the actions of the executive branch by passing something with a majority.”
“If the district court follows Supreme Court precedent, then the joint resolution will have no effect,” he added.
According to Kline, if a lower court ruled otherwise, the administration would likely continue operations while appealing the decision.
“The president will continue these efforts until he believes the objective has been met, and then also appeal any such decision to the Supreme Court,” Kline said. “So what is a lot of symbolic posturing going on.”
“It’s also important to remember, we’ve had numerous circumstances where presidents have engaged in similar activity and only one time when a joint resolution was passed, and that related to President Trump’s actions in Yemen, and that continued. So war powers is more of a political posturing right now,” he added.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
