LAST MONTH, a bipartisan congressional majority voted against further U.S. support for Saudi Arabia’s disastrous intervention in Yemen, which has failed to achieve its aims while helping to produce the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. President Trump vetoed the resolution, and now he has doubled down on offering unqualified support to the Saudi regime and its allies. On Friday, the State Department notified Congress that it was invoking emergency authority to bypass opposition and complete 22 arms deals to Saudi Arabia and several other countries — including more of the munitions that have been killing civilians in Yemen.
The action was another violation by Mr. Trump of established norms, if not law. The administration’s notification did not explain what “emergency” allowed it to use a loophole in the Arms Export Control Act, which gives Congress authority to review weapons sales. Though Secretary of State Mike Pompeo cited the need for Arab nations “to deter and defend themselves” against Iran, some of the arms being provided will not be available for years, which means they are not relevant to the civil war in Yemen or rising tensions elsewhere in the region. Some of the materiel is going to Jordan, which is not at war in Yemen or anywhere else.
The maneuver extends Mr. Trump’s defiance of Congress’s rightful role in shaping U.S. foreign policy. Members of both parties had placed holds on sales to Saudi Arabia, because of its repeated and evidently deliberate bombing of civilian targets in Yemen and because of its refusal to hold senior officials accountable for human rights offenses, including the murder and dismemberment of journalist and Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi. To permanently stop the sales, Congress would have had to pass legislation; Mr. Trump could have and should have allowed the review process to play out.
View the complete commentary by The Washington Post Editorial Board here.