Speaker Johnson: War Powers Act May Be ‘Unconstitutional’

EXCERPT:

JOHNSON: “Many respected constitutional experts argue that the War Powers Act is itself unconstitutional. I’m persuaded by that argument. They think it’s a violation of the Article 2 powers of the commander-in-chief. I think that’s right. If you look back at the Founders’ intent, you read The Federalist Papers, you read the records of the Constitutional Convention, I think that is right. And many more scholars, including the president, is correct to use this executive authority in exactly the manner that he did over the weekend. I am a jealous guardian of Congress’s Article 1 authority. We are the defenders of it here and we take it seriously, and I always will be. But exercising the authority to declare war isn’t something we’ve done since World War II. And everybody in this room knows, since then we’ve had more than 125 military operations, from Korea and Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan. They have occurred without a declaration of war by Congress. Presidents of both parties have exercised that authority frequently.”