MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript: War Powers Act

Interview

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Joining me tonight, Congressman John Garamendi of California. Congressman good to have you with us

REP. JOHN GARAMENDI, (D) CALIFORNIA: My pleasure.

DYSON: Congressman under the War Powers Act, President Obama has 60 days to deploy troops without congressional approval. Just how far do you believe he will exercise this power?

GARAMENDI: Well, I suspect he`ll go the full 60 days. It`s highly unlikely that this refugee and issue will be resolved in the month, month and half. And beyond that there are some very serious problems in the entire area that are not going to go away anytime soon. So, those 60 days are going to run and congress must do its constitutional responsibility which is to take up the issue, stay, expand or get out.

DYSON: Well, if we talk about stay, you know, or get out, the reality is that there`s a lot of political pressure on him either to concede to the wishes of congress along the way as, you know, as an advisory board so to speak to join with him on this. But he`s also facing political opposition from the likes of Lindsey Graham and John McCain. So how does he get out of that kind of conundrum?

GARAMENDI: Well that`s the political conundrum. The real conundrum is in Iraq, how do we deal with that issue there? And when we return in September I would hope that the Congress would conduct a series of very intense briefings and hearings so that we can learn form the President what his goal is, what the extent of the engagement might be, and what the slippery slope might look like?

And then we must under the constitution and under the War`s Powers Act, we must act. We cannot fail to do so if we fail to do so then under the War`s Powers Act, the President must withdraw from -- well, we must -- we simply must act, yes or no, move forward or not.

DYSON: Sure.

GARAMENDI: And that`s the situation. And it`s our responsibility all 535 of us share that responsibility on behalf of the American public. So, it`s his action now, he`s doing what I think is necessary. That is dealing with the immediate situation the refugee situation, the humanitarian situation that he must do.

We are however building up our troops on the ground. We are however starting on that slippery slope. How far it goes? We need to know and we need to make a decision as the representatives of the American people.

DYSON: Well so far the United States has executed airs strikes and Britain has joined our forces in delivering humanitarian airdrops.

GARAMENDI: Right.

DYSON: What do you think of the next steps from there because some people are saying, "Well are going to ask our allies to join us in terms of sending advisers over there?" That begins to, you know, the war creep begins to really ramp up there.

GARAMENDI: Well exactly right. It is the creeping towards war and the slippery slop, all of that. But really this issue is going to have to be resolved in Iraq. We need that political settlement. It seems as though Maliki is on this out. Good. He should have been out a month ago, but if he goes today or tomorrow that`s good. We need a new Prime Minister. We need an inclusive government in Iraq.

We also need to make sure that Kurds, the Turkish people, Syria, Jordan, all of the rest are going to be deeply involved in this. And we know that Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, all of them are at risk. And so we need a unified political action to deal with the ISIL onslaught. If we fail to have that then it may come to us. And then the question is can we do this without that kind of coordinated action among all of the players in the area to do away with this very serious threat to them?

DYSON: Well let me ask you a two-pronged question about Syria. What`s the difference in sentiment between this crisis in Iraq and Syria and do you agree with Senator, you know with Senator McCain and Graham that we should be stretching as far as Syria to do some preemptive strikes there to make sure that we cut off the head, so to speak of ISIS?

GARAMENDI: Well, I think those two fellows would like to bomb everywhere all of the time and I`ve said that much over the last several years. No, I don`t think we had to follow they`re lead all. There`s a much more, a measured way to go about that. The President is going about in a measured way.

And this situation, Syria has evolved over the last three to four years in a way that has in fact lead to the growth of the ISIL or ISIS and that is where we are today. Now, that situation in Syria has spilled over major problem in Iraq and it does require our serious attention. It requires on humanitarian side. It also requires our attention on the political diplomatic side making sure that the Iraqi government becomes inclusive and not giving the Sunnis a reason to fight against the Baghdad government.

And it seems as though that maybe be happening. The new fellow that`s been appointed by the President to become the Prime Minister seems to have the support of the Kurdish people as well as the -- some of the Sunnis if not all of them, that`s a good thing. And if he could pull it together, make a more inclusive government.

And then, I think these air strikes are also giving the Kurdish people and the Iraqi government a little bit of breathing time to get themselves organized, to get the proper weapons, to repel and in fact roll back ISIL.

DYSON: All right. Congressman John Garamendi, thank you so much for joining us tonight.

GARAMENDI: Thank you.

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