A draft budget in the U.S. Congress indicates efforts by the legislature to limit the military powers of the country’s president.
According to the report of Pakistan News Network, citing TASS, the draft defense budget for the U.S. fiscal year shows that Congress intends to repeal two laws passed in 1991 and 2002, which had authorized the U.S. president to conduct military operations in West Asia.
The new fiscal year in the United States began on October 1.
Under the U.S. Constitution, the authority to declare war lies with Congress, not the president. However, over the past few decades, U.S. presidents have interpreted these laws broadly to justify military campaigns in West Asia.
Several members of Congress have also introduced draft resolutions requiring the president to seek congressional approval before deploying military forces, but none of these proposals have been approved so far.
Representatives from both the Democratic and Republican parties have now decided to repeal the two laws that, in recent years, have served as the legal basis for U.S. presidential military operations in West Asia.
Previously, Congress had formed a joint committee of members from both chambers to reconcile the two different versions of the defense budget submitted by the House of Representatives and the Senate. Typically, the final reconciled defense budget is approved quickly.