Rand Paul Calls for Restoring Congressional Authority in Use of Military Force

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) wants Congress to vote on the use of military force against ISIS. He is planning on introducing an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act of 2017 that would end the Obama administration’s use of the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) of 2001 and 2003 to combat ISIS.

“We will try to get a vote on it,” Paul said to Roll Call.

Paul wrote an opinion piece in Time magazine that calls for restoring congressional authority in declaring war.

“Re-examining the proper legal relationship over congressional vs. executive authority is long overdue. Since 9/11, America has been in a perpetual war mode and largely without precedent in our history,” Paul wrote. “The costs, in lives and dollars, of the last 15 years of our foreign policy have been staggering and the benefits are somewhere between questionable and negligible.”

Paul slammed Obama for being hypocritical, highlighting that Obama called for a repeal of the AUMF when he was running for president back in 2008 and now “hides” behind it.

“So let’s have a debate about the current AUMF. We should end them. And we certainly should at least stand up and say if you want new wars, you need new congressional authority,” Paul wrote.

Paul has introduced several amendments into the NDAA of 2017, including one that would end the draft and another that would declassify 28 pages of the 9/11 report.