The Washington Post: As Senate prepares to vote to curtail U.S. support for Yemen war, House remains divided on Saudi Arabia
As the Senate prepares to deliver a historic, bipartisan rebuke of the United States' continued support for Saudi Arabia's war effort in Yemen, House lawmakers remain bitterly divided along party lines about whether to challenge President Trump's continued support for the Kingdom, even in the face of evidence implicating its crown prince in the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
House lawmakers emerged from a closed-door briefing with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis Thursday urging very different responses to Saudi Arabia and its crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, whom a recent CIA assessment found was probably responsible for the killing of Khashoggi, a Washington Post contributing columnist, in a Saudi consulate in Istanbul.
"They have to be held responsible," Rep. Eliot L. Engel (D-N.Y.), the incoming chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said after the briefing, referring to Mohammed and Saudi King Salman.
On Yemen, Engel added that while the Saudis were right to worry about the growing influence of Houthi rebels aligned with Iran, "we cannot use it as an excuse to just say ‘whatever the Saudi government is doing is okay because we're fighting for the greater cause.'"
But there remain Republicans in the House who defend the crown prince — and those who think that even if he should be called out for his involvement in Khashoggi's death, the punishment should stop there.
"We recognize killing journalists is absolutely evil and despicable, but to completely realign our interests in the Middle East as a result of this, when for instance the Russians kill journalists...Turkey imprisons journalists?" Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) said. "It's not a sinless world out there."
That stands in sharp contrast to the Senate, where several Republicans have been encouraging a broad response to Saudi Arabia over not just Khashoggi's killing and the Yemen war, but the Kingdom's blockade in Qatar, its recent detainment of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, and a slate of human rights abuses they say have compromised the U.S.-Saudi alliance.
The Senate is likely on Thursday to pass a resolution seeking to invoke the War Powers Resolution to curtail U.S. support for the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen. Sixty senators voted on Wednesday to debate the resolution — a showing that suggests that even if the effort fails to pass both chambers of Congress, senators are building momentum to challenge Saudi Arabia and Trump's support for it that will continue into next year.
Trump has refused to condemn Mohammed for killing Khashoggi, a Saudi national, in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on Oct. 2. Pompeo has echoed Trump's stance in public interviews, and behind closed doors as well, lawmakers said.
"All we heard today was more disgraceful ducking and dodging by the secretary," said Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Tex.), who supports bringing up a War Powers resolution in the House to cut off U.S. support for the Saudis' Yemen war effort. On Wednesday, the House narrowly voted to block rank-and-file members from demanding a floor vote on any such Yemen resolution, after leaders slipped in a rule change to do so into an unrelated agricultural bill.
On Wednesday, House leaders also met with CIA director Gina Haspel to be briefed about the details of Khashoggi's slaying. But they emerged offering few details about the briefing — or about what step House Democrats would take, once they assume the majority in January, to pursue more punitive measures against Saudi Arabia, beyond holding hearings.
In the Senate, meanwhile, both Republican and Democratic lawmakers are making plans to capitalize on the Yemen resolution vote with further measures next year — including sanctions on Mohammed and the other Saudis implicated in Khashoggi's killing, and an order to halt all nondefensive weapons transfers to Saudi Arabia until hostilities in Yemen cease.
"The current relationship with Saudi Arabia is not working for America," Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) said Wednesday, in comments to reporters about what next steps senators planned to take to address Saudi policy. "I'm never going to let this go until things change in Saudi Arabia."