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For the first time since President Obama took office in 2009, Congress has overridden his veto.
The U.S. Senate voted 97-1 to override President Obama's veto of the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, which would allow victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks to sue Saudi Arabia. The lone dissenting vote was Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada), who has "always had the president's back":
In a letter Monday to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Tex.) and ranking member Adam Smith (D-Wash.), Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter warned that allowing the bill to become law risked "damaging our close and effective cooperation with other countries" and "could ultimately have a chilling effect on our own counter-terrorism efforts." Thornberry and Smith both circulated letters among members in the last few days, urging them to vote against overriding the veto. CIA Director John O. Brennan also warned of the 9/11 bill's "grave implications for the national security of the United States" in a statement Wednesday.
The House of Representatives voted 348-to-77:
Congress on Wednesday voted overwhelmingly to override a veto by President Obama for the first time, passing into law a bill that would allow the families of those killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to sue Saudi Arabia for any role in the plot.
Democrats in large numbers joined with Republicans to deliver a remarkable rebuke to the president. The 97-to-1 vote in the Senate and the 348-to-77 vote in the House displayed the enduring power of the Sept. 11 families in Washington and the diminishing influence here of the Saudi government.
See also: The Risks of Suing the Saudis for 9/11 by the New York Times Editorial Board and this article in the Saudi Gazette.
Previously: President Obama to Veto Bill Allowing September 11 Victims to Sue Saudi Arabia
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bradley13 on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:37PM
What a stupid precedent.
If the US acknowledges that countries can be sued for financial damages to foreigners, how about a class action suit on behalf of all citizens of Libya who have suffered in the chaos of the last few years? Add in the citizens of Iraq, who also used to have a functioning country. Oh, Afghanistan and Syria, both of which the US also pushed into chaos.
What would it cost to reimburse the entire population of four countries? That's more than 90 million people, say an average reimbursement of $10k each, so around $9 trillion should do it. Oh, Europe would like some compensation as well, since we've absorbed millions of the people displaced by US actions. We'll just round up to $10 trillion. Wire transfer will be fine.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:38PM
Oops...dropped a decimal place somewhere. Still, the point stands.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday September 29 2016, @07:21PM
You need the permission of the US govt. to sue it in a US court. They could already sue in Libyan courts, but that would only affect US govt. assets in Libya.
The interesting thing is what would be the effect on suing in some non-US court of a country where there were significant US govt. resources.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by lcklspckl on Thursday September 29 2016, @08:00PM
I have a lot of questions. Mostly about what unscrupulous U.S. citizens might do with the law. How does a U.S. court expect to enforce a ruling? Can a winner of such a suit then sue the U.S. to enforce the ruling through diplomatic policies or force? This sounds to me like congress (the people) opening a can of unintended consequences. This is the first I've heard of what court would rule on such a case. I'm genuinely interested in the enforcement vehicle. Does this include seizing assets or humans from another country that visit the U.S.A. if ruled against? How about allies? Can I personally sue, say for example, Denmark or France for releasing a human from prison known to have engaged in blowing up innocent and unsuspecting humans, who then does just that in the U.S.A. sometime after release, but who is now dead and so offers no recourse of punishment?
I suspect that this will backfire, but I'm willing to change my mind once some the questions are answered. I'm just not sure there's a lot of precedent for this.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday September 29 2016, @10:16PM
I don't think it's any worse than ordinary. And the government is likely to arrange that the verdict of the suit suites their desires. Since it's a suit rather than a case of criminal law, the suer will only need to show "the preponderance of the evidence", but showing that a foreign government knew anything about what's going on rather than certain individuals will be difficult, and the individuals probably won't have any local assets.
So I think that the effect will just be PR and some employment for lawyers.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday September 29 2016, @10:48PM
>How does a U.S. court expect to enforce a ruling?
The same way they would against anyone else who refuses to pay a fine while owning assets in the US - seize the assets to pay the debt. The Saudis own a *lot* of assets in the US - and have threatened to sell them off if this bill passed in order to avoid presenting such a convenient target.
(Score: 1) by lcklspckl on Friday September 30 2016, @01:39AM
This is sort of what I was thinking. I didn't get to the end of the thread but I did find this on it. I can figure the consequences from there. Interesting reading. This seems like a fairly remarkable change in doctrine, even if it is for a limited purpose supposedly.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity?wprov=sfii1 [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Sovereign_Immunities_Act [wikipedia.org]
This is a guy sort of talking hypothetical with regard to why a government might or not allow this. Nothing deep.
https://www.quora.com/Can-you-file-a-lawsuit-against-a-country [quora.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 29 2016, @08:03PM
Europe? Yeah, well, maybe we'll start sending them bills for their part of NATO they've never upheld for the last 60 years.
Fucking Eurotards love to sit on their hands and have the US do their messy work, then have the gall to act indignant and moral and criticize the US for doing that dirty work.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 29 2016, @09:19PM
You overlook that the US role in NATO was in their post-war self-interest as the natural ally of Europe would have been Russia. Speaking of Russia; The resurgent nationalism we're seeing throughout the West is a reaction to emerging globalist oligarchs who fancy themselves above the rule of law.