Late last night, at 9pm Eastern, Trump ordered an unauthorized, strategy-free, dangerous strike on Syria

 late last night, at 9pm Eastern, Trump ordered an unauthorized, strategy-free, dangerous strike on Syria.

It wasn’t a bait and switch. It’s not 12-dimensional chess. He’s not outfoxing anyone. With this strike, Trump is transparently gambling with the safety of the Syrian people, and pulling us closer to war with Russia and Iran, to distract from his own legal troubles.

The strike comes just days after horrific images out of Syria showed yet another apparent deadly chemical attack from the Assad regime on the people of Syria. And, in the face of events like that, the instinct to want to “do something” is understandable.

But Trump has no real interest in the safety of the Syrian people. The US has only accepted 11 Syrian refugees this year. And strikes put Syrians in greater risk of harm by escalating war and bloodshed. Trump’s message to the Syrian people? Stay there, we’ll bomb you. Come here, we’ll ban you.

Trump clearly has zero respect for the people of Syria, as his actions have put them at greater risk. We know he has zero respect for the rule of law, since these strikes are unconstitutional absent congressional authority. He also has zero strategy, evidenced by his Administration’s failure to articulate just how these strikes address the chemical weapons attack and what the plan is from here.

Though we’re still grappling with this news (and we know you are too), we want to let you know (like we always do) where you can have an impact on this important, emerging issue.

What your members of Congress should do:

Though they don’t always act like it, Congress is a co-equal branch of government that holds tremendous power to check Trump’s recklessness. There are a number of concrete steps that Congress can and should pursue.Any single one of these actions is better than allowing Trump’s one-off missile strikes to continue:

• Publicly voice support for the ongoing investigation by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons into the chemical weapons attack
• Forcefully insist on its sole authority to authorize military force by demanding that Trump come to Congress before any further strikes in Syria
• Vote NO on any authorization for further force in Syria, based on Trump’s demonstrated recklessness and lack of a full strategy
• Publicly denounce Trump’s bigoted Muslim and refugee bans that are harming victims of violence in Syria and elsewhere, and call on the Administration to immediately resettle more Syrian refugees
• Call on the Administration to lead not by military force, but by engaging international partners to seek a diplomatic and political solution to end Syria’s suffering
• Hold hearings to assess the US government’s own global war operations and the resulting ramped-up civilian body count across the world

Call your MoC and tell them to do everything in their power to rein in Trump’s Syrian escalation. Urge the Administration to lead with diplomacy to help the people of Syria. You can view our resource, and call script, here.

Next, take action to stop Trump’s War Cabinet:

While Trump surrounds himself with “his generals” and warmongers like John Bolton, he has two more highly questionable Cabinet nominations coming up for a vote soon in the Senate:

1. Trump has nominated Mike Pompeo (former MoC and current CIA Director) to replace Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State. In his hearing with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday, he didn’t rule out a ground war in North Korea, and said that Trump has the authority to attack Syria without Congressional approval (he doesn’t). If he’s confirmed as Secretary of State, Pompeo will export Trumpism across the globe. Use our resource and call script to take action now-- the Senate could vote on Pompeo as early as this week.
2. To replace Pompeo at the CIA, Trump has nominated Gina Haspel, a war criminal who personally helped torture detainees in a secret CIA-run prison in Thailand during the Bush Administration. Alberto Mora, former chief counsel of the Navy in the Bush administration, argues that there’s nothing else senators need to know to make their decision. Haspel is a torturer and is therefore unfit to lead the CIA. Her committee hearings, and a Senate vote, will likely come after Pompeo’s. But it’s never too early to read our resource and use our call script to let your MoCs know you don’t want a torturer to run the CIA.

It’s been a hard week. And it’s made one thing clear: we must remain vigilant at all times. The United States is escalating the conflict in Syria. Trump could still fire Rosenstein at any moment. And all the while, he’s trying to pull together a war Cabinet so that he can drag us into yet another endless war.

Protecting our democracy is a battle we have to fight on multiple fronts at the same time, and we’re proud to be in it with all of you.

Source Messege from idivisable 

http://footprintsstrategies.com