Senate to debate U.S. support for Saudi-led war in Yemen
WASHINGTON — The Senate voted Wednesday to formally start debating a measure to end U.S. support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen, setting up what is likely to be the first of several bipartisan rebukes of President Donald Trump’s support of Saudi Arabia that senators hope to deliver.
The 60-37 vote exceeded the expectations of the Yemen resolution’s supporters, who had guessed that most of the 14 Republicans who supported the measure through an opening procedural hurdle last month would peel away as it advanced. But 11 Republicans joined all Democrats in voting to start debating the resolution.
Should even part of that coalition hold together, the Senate is set to deliver a historic message to Trump that the status quo on Saudi relations is no longer acceptable.
Lawmakers have launched several efforts to condemn, chastise or curtail traditional U.S. support to Saudi Arabia after the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post contributing columnist.
Momentum around several of those efforts — particularly the Yemen resolution from Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Mike Lee, R-Utah — built dramatically after the CIA determined that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was probably responsible for Khashoggi’s killing in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, findings Trump has dismissed as he continues to embrace the prince.
Wednesday’s Senate vote came hours after CIA Director Gina Haspel briefed the House about the agency’s assessment that Mohammed probably ordered the
Khashoggi.
It was the second time in two weeks that she has given lawmakers a closeddoor look at the CIA’s classified examination of Khashoggi’s death. It is based in part on intercepted communications between the crown prince and one of his top aides, who investigators think oversaw the team that killed and dismembered the journalist Oct. 2.
After Haspel briefed senators last week, they accused Mohammed of complicity in the death of Khashoggi, whose writings were critical of the crown prince. Later this week, senators are expected to vote on a resolution condemning Mohammed as responsible for Khashoggi’s killing.
But in the House, senior members have been far more tight-lipped about their plans.
The Sanders-Lee resolution that is expected to pass the Senate this week is all but guaranteed to be dead on arrival in the House, where lawmakers narrowly voted Wednesday to block any similar resolution from consideration.
Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., the incoming chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has committed to holding a series of hear-
killing of ings early next year, on a variety of issues relating to Saudi policy, including the war in Yemen. But those plans lack the specificity of activity underway in the Senate, where lawmakers are already planning how to pivot off a successful vote on the Sanders-Lee measure to work on others in the new year.
Chief among their new targets is a bill, sponsored by Sens. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., and Todd Young, R-Ind., that would sanction Saudi officials found to be responsible for Khashoggi’s death. The measure also would stop the transfer of anything but purely defensive weapons to Saudi Arabia until it ends hostilities in Yemen.
When House leaders emerged from the briefing with Haspel, none claimed that her testimony had proved Mohammed’s culpability — in stark contrast to what senators said after their similar session last week.
The full House is expected to be briefed Thursday by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who also spoke with senators late last month. Both have adopted a stance closer to that of Trump, who emphasizes that Mohammed told him on several occasions that he was not involved.