Bill Maher recently surprised California Senator Adam Schiff during a conversation about the military actions against Iran, which inadvertently led Schiff to criticize the Obama administration. This unexpected turn of events unfolded on Maher’s show, “Real Time,” last Friday.
During the discussion, Maher quoted a statement from 2011 regarding presidential authority to initiate military strikes. However, he strategically omitted the fact that this statement originated from President Obama’s team. Maher posed the question to Schiff, “This statement from the administration: ‘The president had the constitutional authority to direct the use of military force because he could reasonably determine that such use of force was in the national interest.’ That’s too vague for you?” This question was directed at Schiff, who has been a vocal critic of President Trump’s unilateral military action against Iran.
Schiff, without realizing the source of the quote, replied with certainty, “Totally vague.” This led Maher to reveal, “OK. Because that’s from Obama about Libya,” catching Schiff off guard.
Attempting to recover, Schiff acknowledged the context, saying, “Well, Obama made the argument, um, initially that he could go into Syria without an authorization,” while emphasizing his opposition to that decision.
“OK. Because that’s from Obama about Libya,” the host revealed.
“Well, Obama made the argument, um, initially that he could go into Syria without an authorization,” the senator said while trying to gather himself, adding that he opposed the move.
“I and many others pushed back on that argument. Ultimately, he did not go forward with going after [former Syrian President] Assad — even though Assad was gassing his own people — because he thought he might lose the vote in Congress.
“But I respect the fact that, uh, that was important to [Obama], and the fact that he did not have the support of Congress meant that we weren’t going to go forward,” Schiff concluded.
The senator said earlier this week that he was going to force a vote in Congress to prevent Trump from “abusing his power,” after joint US-Israeli strikes last week killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei along with 40 top security and regime officials.
“There was no imminent threat to justify starting a war with Iran,” he said. “Instead, Donald Trump chose the path of more chaos — with American lives on the line. I’m joining my colleagues in forcing a vote to stop the president from abusing his power.”
