Bipartisan majority in U.S. House votes to terminate Trump’s fake national emergency

A bipar­ti­san major­i­ty of the Unit­ed House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives has vot­ed to ter­mi­nate the fake nation­al emer­gency declared ear­li­er this month by Don­ald Trump, set­ting up a day of reck­on­ing in the Unit­ed States Sen­ate that will force Repub­li­cans to pub­licly choose between their alle­giance to Trump or the U.S. Constitution.

“Is your oath of office to Don­ald Trump or is your oath of office to the Con­sti­tu­tion of the Unit­ed States?,” Speak­er Nan­cy Pelosi asked Repub­li­cans in her floor speech urg­ing approval of House Joint Res­o­lu­tion 46. “You can­not let him under­mine the strength of your pledge to pro­tect and defend the Constitution.”

“We in the People’s House are the keep­ers of this Con­sti­tu­tion,” Pelosi added.

“We in the Con­gress are the keep­ers of this Con­sti­tu­tion. We in the Con­gress, in Arti­cle I, the Con­gress of the Unit­ed States, spelled out very clear­ly in the Con­sti­tu­tion, the pow­ers giv­en to the Leg­isla­tive branch: the pow­ers of the purse, the pow­er to declare war – pow­ers enu­mer­at­ed very care­ful­ly by our Founders.”

In the end, just thir­teen Repub­li­cans crossed over to join two hun­dred and thir­ty-two Democ­rats in vot­ing for the his­toric and vital­ly need­ed res­o­lu­tion. The final vote was two hun­dred and forty-five to one hun­dred and eighty-two.

The roll call from the Pacif­ic North­west was as follows:

Vot­ing Aye [For the Con­sti­tu­tion]: Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Suzan Del­Bene, Rick Larsen, Derek Kilmer, Prami­la Jaya­pal, Kim Schri­er, Adam Smith, Den­ny Heck (WA), Suzanne Bonam­i­ci, Earl Blu­me­nauer,  Kurt Schrad­er (OR); Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers and Jaime Her­rera-Beut­ler (WA), Greg Walden (OR)

Vot­ing Nay [For Don­ald Trump]: Repub­li­can Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Dan New­house (WA), Russ Fulcher and Mike Simp­son (ID), Greg Gian­forte (MT), Don Young (AK)

Not Vot­ing: Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Pete DeFazio (OR)

Wash­ing­ton State’s con­gres­sion­al del­e­ga­tion was near­ly unan­i­mous in buck­ing Trump thanks to the aye votes of Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers and Jaime Her­rera-Beut­ler, which will like­ly come as a sur­prise to many Cas­ca­dia Advo­cate read­ers. Only Dan New­house betrayed his oath of office to side with Trump.

Ore­gon’s con­gres­sion­al del­e­ga­tion was also one vote shy of unan­i­mous­ly rebuk­ing Trump because Demo­c­ra­t­ic Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Pete DeFazio missed the vote.

“The vote today to ter­mi­nate Pres­i­dent Trump’s unlaw­ful nation­al emer­gency dec­la­ra­tion sends a clear mes­sage to the Pres­i­dent and this Admin­is­tra­tion that the new House major­i­ty is seri­ous about over­sight and account­abil­i­ty,” said U.S. Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Adam Smith, Chair of the House Armed Ser­vices Committe.

“House Democ­rats are not going to stand by while the Pres­i­dent abus­es his pow­er by declar­ing a nation­al emer­gency to build his wall,” Smith added. “This nation­al emer­gency dec­la­ra­tion is built on xeno­pho­bic lies and mis­char­ac­ter­i­za­tions about immi­grants, and it is dan­ger­ous and wrong for the Pres­i­dent to cir­cum­vent Con­gress by steal­ing funds from mil­i­tary readi­ness for his polit­i­cal agenda.”

“I strong­ly sup­port Con­gress­man Castro’s res­o­lu­tion to ter­mi­nate the nation­al emer­gency. We will con­tin­ue to fight this unlaw­ful pow­er grab.”

The Unit­ed States Sen­ate is now required by law to take up the res­o­lu­tion. Three Repub­li­cans have already said they will vote yes (Susan Collins, Thom Tillis, Lisa Murkows­ki), which means the res­o­lu­tion is close to hav­ing the votes that it needs to pass. Collins and Tillis will face the vot­ers in 2020 and are con­sid­ered vulnerable.