Congressman to Trump: If You're So Anti-War, Get Out of Yemen

As the White House prepares to wage another fight with Congress to preserve its involvement in the Yemen war, opponents plan to use President Trump's criticisms of endless, pointless wars as either a lever or a cudgel.

"I think we're going to start with the secretary of defense and then perhaps other people close to the president, making the case that the president's view of withdrawal from Afghanistan and Syria should lead him to, at least, withdraw from Yemen," Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), the chief sponsor of a House resolution to compel the U.S. to end its participation in the Saudi-led war, told The Daily Beast. "It makes no sense to call for greater restraint and an end to endless war and then to have us involved in Yemen."

On Wednesday, the House is slated to take up a procedural vote on Khanna's resolution, which holds that under the 1973 War Powers Resolution, Congress never authorized American involvement in the nearly four-year old war on Yemen and the U.S. military must end its contributions, which currently include providing intelligence to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Since Khanna's measure has the support of the House Democratic leadership, the resolution is considered a lock to pass. A substantive vote could come as soon as this week.

Trump, however, is vowing to fight Khanna's resolution, much as he opposed the 2018-era congressional effort to get the U.S. out of Yemen.

On Tuesday afternoon, the White House threatened to veto the resolution. Reiterating a Pentagon contention, it claimed the War Powers Resolution doesn't apply to a conflict where the U.S. isn't a direct combatant, and would "harm bilateral relationships in the region"—a reference to Trump's closeness with the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, which is unaffected by a CIA assessment that the Saudi crown prince was the architect of journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder.

While Trump professes antipathy for several U.S. conflicts, Yemen isn't one of them. Trump has long considered the 17-year old Afghanistan war a waste (even though, as president, he escalated it anyway). He authorized an envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad, to explore peace with the Taliban, and Khalilzad believes they have a preliminary framework for a negotiated settlement. And in December, Trump ordered the approximately 2000 U.S. troops out of Syria—though the administration keeps delaying the pace of that withdrawal—which prompted the resignations of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and anti-Islamic State coalition diplomat Brett McGurk.

It's unclear what Trump's new acting defense secretary, Patrick Shanahan, thinks about the Yemen war and U.S. involvement, and if he'll meet with Khanna to discuss the congressman's resolution. Shanahan traveled this week to Afghanistan and Iraq, and a spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.