A resolution championed by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) calling for the United States to withdraw its troops from Syria failed to clear the House.
The measure was shot down on Wednesday in a 103-321 vote. Forty-seven Republicans and 56 Democrats voted in favor of Gaetz’s War Powers Resolution Act, which would have directed President Joe Biden to bring the roughly 900 U.S. troops in Syria home within 180 days unless Congress authorized an extended deployment.
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Gaetz had filed the resolution after a Feb. 17 press release from U.S. Central Command stated that four American service members were wounded in a raid in northeastern Syria to take out a senior ISIS leader.
“If Joe Biden wants to keep us in Syria’s war, then he must explain to the American people why, what the goal is, and what winning looks like. Until then, every member of the House of Representatives will vote on the record on whether they support continuing war in Syria or not,” Gaetz said in a statement ahead of the vote.
Due to the fact that war powers resolutions are privileged, Gaetz could force a vote on the measure within 18 days of him unveiling it. Gaetz is a member of the House Armed Services Committee.
“America First means actually putting the people of our country first — not the interests of the Military Industrial Complex,” he said.
The House Progressive Caucus encouraged its 100-plus members to back Gaetz’s bill. Last year, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) unveiled a similar proposal that attracted 155 votes in favor, including 25 Republicans. Gaetz was one of them.
Robert Ford, the former ambassador to Syria under the Obama administration, also urged members of Congress to support Gaetz’s resolution.
“After more than eight years of military operations in Syria there is no definition of what the ‘enduring’ defeat of ISIS would look like,” he wrote in a letter to Congress obtained by the Intercept. “We owe our soldiers serving there in harm’s way a serious debate about whether their mission is, in fact, achievable.”
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On Saturday, Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made a surprise trip to Syria in a Kurdish-controlled controlled region to examine United States operations. He underscored the importance of having a military engagement in the region to curtail terrorist threats.
“Unless you support and devote the correct amount of resources to it, things will get worse,” he told reporters, the New York Times reported. “If you completely ignore and turn your back, then you’re setting the conditions for a resurgence.”
