After decades of advocacy from FCNL’s network and the broader peace movement, the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) in Iraq has finally been repealed!
This is a major win for peace — and an important milestone in our advocacy efforts to urge Congress to reclaim its constitutional war powers and end endless wars.
The 2002 Iraq AUMF was repealed with bipartisan support as part of the annual military policy bill, the National Defense Authorization Act or NDAA, which was signed into law Thursday evening by President Trump.
Here’s why it matters
This AUMF authorized the Iraq War, which began in 2003 and was declared over by President Obama in 2011. Yet the AUMF remained active until now, allowing subsequent administrations to misuse it to justify military actions never intended by Congress.
Notably, this included the first Trump administration’s drone assassination of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in 2020, which brought the U.S. to the brink of a disastrous war with Iran.
The Trump and Biden administrations also cited this AUMF to justify strikes against Iran-aligned militias in Iraq and Syria in recent years.
The power of persistent advocacy
The repeal of the 2002 Iraq AUMF is a testament to the power of grassroots advocacy and the persistent efforts of so many of you in FCNL’s network.
This was the focus of our Advocacy Teams’ work in 2021, which laid the foundations for this victory. Despite several attempts that came up just short, we never gave up, building more and more bipartisan support for this effort every year.
We also want to thank former Rep. Barbara Lee, who tirelessly championed this effort in Congress for so many years, paving the way for this repeal.
Where we go from here
While we celebrate this historic milestone, we must also remain focused on the urgent work for peace that remains before us.
Along with urging Congress to stop President Trump’s murderous boat strikes and prevent a new forever war with Venezuela, our work to repeal outdated and dangerous war authorizations continues.
In the coming year, we will be working to support renewed bipartisan efforts to repeal the 2001 AUMF, the sweeping post-9/11 war authorization that has served as a blank check for endless wars for far too long.
Elsewhere
“The president has no right to murder.”
FCNL Education Fund’s Scoville Fellow, Lydia El-Sayegh, broke down in Inkstick how all of the recent boat strikes in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean are acts of murder on the part of the Trump administration. Extrajudicial killings, while the United States is not at war, do not leave any ambiguity.
The United States is continuing to kill people, and ramp up its escalations and threats of war against Venezuela. War is never the answer, not to our drug crisis or to foreign policy disputes.
Dehumanizing attacks against immigrants
President Trump expanded his travel ban to include more countries fully and partially banned – an attempt to dehumanize people based on where they are from. This comes after the rhetoric of his administration has been consistently demeaning, not living up to our shared values.
Reports are continuing to come out about grotesque human rights abuses and deaths in detention camps. As one Amnesty International expert put it, “Immigration enforcement cannot operate outside the rule of law or exempt itself from human rights standards.”
Dehumanizing words lead to dehumanizing actions. The administration must correct course and Congress must hold them accountable.
FCNL Voices
- Mary Lou Hatcher led worship during FCNL’s Annual Meeting 2025, offering three guideposts or practices to nurture our spiritual walk. Her reflections have been published in a series on FCNL’s website over the past week, available here, here, and here.
- FCNL’s Bridget Moix wrote in RNS on President Trump’s claims to have brought peace – while truly only implementing transactional deals that do nothing to foster a lasting end to violence.
