A pretty remarkable development in today's House Appropriations markup on the Defense Appopriations bill. For many years, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) has been putting forward amendments intended to repeal or sunset the 2001 AUMF. They normally do not go anywhere. This morning she moved one that would terminate the 2001 AUMF in 240 days, and lo-and-behold the majority went along with it. It passed with only Kay Granger (R-TX) opposing.

It is past time for Congress to update the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF), explicitly authorizing the armed conflict with the Islamic State while also adding further important reforms to that foundational instrument. The bill that Senators Flake (R-AZ) and Kaine (D-VA) introduced this week would serve that purpose well.

As several colleagues noted last week, Representative Adam Schiff has revived his effort to get Congress to replace the 2001 and 2002 AUMFs with a new “Consolidated AUMF” that would explicitly name the Islamic State (he had a similar bill in the last Congress, which Jack endorsed here). What follows below is a section-by-section analysis of H.J. Res.

As Ben noted, earlier today the White House released a report on the legal and policy frameworks guiding the use of military force and related nation security operations. The document, as Ben puts it “the closest thing the administration has ever produced” to a comprehensive account of its legal views. Below is a detailed summary of the report.

Part One: Key Frameworks Related to the Use of Military Force Overseas