The House of Representatives passed a bill on Friday on a voice vote that would allow the family members of those who lost their lives during the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, to sue the nation of Saudi Arabia in US courts.
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The House passed the legislation overnight by a voice vote, about four months after the measure cleared the Senate despite vehement objections from Saudi Arabia.
“The legislation gives access to the courts, to the rule of law, ” said Republican Rep. Ted Poe of Texas.
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, a co-sponsor of the bill, told reporters in May that he is confident that if the bill is vetoed the Senate would be able to override it because they do not believe the arguments the White House is making stand up.
“If they’ve done nothing wrong, they have nothing to worry about”, said Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer of NY, a vocal advocate for the measure. The White House has not issued an official position on the bill and spokesmen have been careful with their language, stopping short of issuing a full veto threat.
Current U.S. law only allows victims to sue a country that is officially designated as a state sponsor of terrorism. Adel al-Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, said his country would be forced to sell up to $750bn in treasury securities and other assets in the U.S. before they could be frozen by American courts. President Obama is widely expected to veto the bill, at which point the House and Senate would require a new vote with a two-thirds majority in each chamber to overturn the veto.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., cited Saudi Arabia’s poor human rights record and the kingdom’s role in Yemen’s civil war.
The vote came after House members sang “God Bless America” on Capitol Hill to commemorate 9/11, just as they had immediately after the attacks on NY in 2001.
Long before the House approved the legislation, president Obama said that he fully intends to veto the legislation if it makes it to his desk.
“The unity Americans felt in the days after 9/11 lives on in a determination to hold whoever was complicit in attacks on USA soil accountable, as existing law provides and as JASTA clarifies”. The new bill doesn’t require such a designation, which would allow suits against Saudi Arabia, according to a Wall Street Journal op-ed (sub. req.) that opposes the bill. This summer, 28 pages of previously classified material from a congressional investigation into the 9/11 attacks concerning suspected connections between Saudi Arabian officials and the hijackers who carried out the attacks were released. “Possibly”, he added. “For our government to obstruct the 9/11 victims, their families, from seeking the truth about Saudi Arabia and its involvement is just flat wrong”.
Schumer urged the Obama administration to sign the legislation “for the sake of the families who have suffered such losses”. In September, U.S. District Judge George B. Daniels of the Southern District of NY said the court lacked jurisdiction. The allegations were never substantiated by later United States investigations into the terrorist attacks. A document released a year ago stated that al-Bouyoumi has “ties to the Saudi Government and many in the local Muslim community in San Diego believed that he was a Saudi intelligence officer”.
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The Saudi foreign minister warned the bill would strip the principle of sovereign immunity and usher in the “law of the jungle”.
