The House rebuked President Obama's decision to intervene in Libya in March without consent from Congress, voting on Friday to demand the White House provide a specific justification of the national security importance of military action in Libya.
The U.S. entered Libya in mid-March and is now engaged in a NATO mission to oust dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
Just after approving a resolution drafted by Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) in a 268-145 vote, the House voted down a more drastic resolution that would have demanded a withdrawal from Libya within 15 days. That bill, written by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), failed in a 148 to 265 vote, garnering 87 votes from Republicans and 61 from Democrats -- a surprising tally for a measure from one of the most liberal Democrats in Congress.
As the House of Representatives debated the two resolutions, each party splintered over support for its leadership. Democrats divided into Kucinich supporters and defenders of Obama, who said the administration was right to intervene in Libya.
While 223 Republicans voted in support of Boehner's resolution, others said the bill was too weak and did not offer a sufficiently strong condemnation of Obama's actions.
The Boehner resolution, unlike Kucinich's, includes no specific demands for the administration's military decisions, instead focusing on admonishing the president for failing to ask Congress before intervening in a foreign country. But the measure does not say that Obama's actions were in violation of the 1973 War Powers Resolution, which states that Congress must authorize the use of force, as Kucinich's does.
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