By David Morgan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday turned back a bid by hardline conservatives to end five presidential emergency declarations that allow for sanctions against America's enemies in the Middle East and Africa.
Four Republican Representatives - Lauren Boebert, Matt Gaetz, Paul Gosar and Eli Crane - used separate measures known as privileged resolutions to require votes on whether to end longstanding emergency declarations involving Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Libya and Democratic Republic of Congo.
The House overwhelmingly rejected the resolutions in a series of votes, after mainstream Republicans and Democrats warned that ending the emergencies would unfreeze the assets of militia leaders, arms dealers and accused war criminals, while denying compensation to U.S. victims of terrorism.
The hardliners said the emergency declarations, dating back to the presidencies of Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Barack Obama, were out-of-date and had become examples of the "deep state," former President Donald Trump's conspiratorial term for Washington officials who opposed his will.
It marked the latest effort by hardline conservatives to force Democrats, fellow Republicans and their own party leaders to vote on controversial measures that otherwise would not reach the House floor or be a long time in coming.
"Nothing gets accomplished here without force," said Boebert, a Colorado firebrand who pursued a similar legislative avenue last month in an effort to force a vote on a measure to impeach Biden.
Hardliner Republicans, including members of the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus, have also used their political leverage in the closely divided chamber to promote "culture war" legislation and pressure House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to accept fiscal 2024 spending targets lower than those he agreed with Democratic President Joe Biden.
Under House rules, privileged resolutions of the kind pursued on Tuesday must come up for a vote within two legislative days.
The hardliners said they would bring additional resolutions to draw attention to 41 national emergency declarations, including one against Iran dating back to the 1970s, which they said have been allowed to remain in place without adequate Congress review.
"There'll be 36 more coming your way, because once again, when Congress doesn't do its job, somebody's got to squawk. And I'll be one of those that squawks from here to the sunset," Gosar said in the floor debate.
Elizabeth Goitein, a senior director at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University, said emergency declarations to buttress sanctions against foreign regimes have not been used to get around Congress.
Trump, a hero to Republican hardliners, did use a 2019 national emergency declaration to fund construction of a wall at the U.S.-Mexico border over the opposition of congressional Democrats.
"Trump was probably the first president to use the National Emergency Act and national emergency declarations for the express purpose of getting around Congress on a question of long term policy," Goitein said.
Both Republicans and Democrats said they agreed with the objective of improving the national emergency system.
"While I understand my colleagues' desire to reform the national emergency process, empowering terrorists, corrupt officials and war criminals is not the answer. And draining the fund that assists victims of terrorist attacks should be a crime in and of itself," said Republican Representative Mike Lawler.