Ilhan Omar Aims at Repealing Alien Enemies Act, Blocking Military Force Against Designated Terrorist Organizations
Democrat Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar is seeking to amend the National Defense Authorization Act to potentially block the Trump administration from using military force against congressionally designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations, such as foreign drug cartels.
A press release from Omar’s office claims her amendment, Amendment #1273, “expresses the sense of Congress that designation of a foreign terrorist organization does not constitute an authorization for the use of military force.”
While Omar’s office did not respond to the Daily Signal’s request for comment and offered no public explanation of why she introduced the amendment, Matt O’Brien, Federation of American Immigration Reform deputy executive director and former immigration judge, told the Daily Signal that he believes the representative “is clearly seeking to curtail any legal authorities that permit the president to control the borders and prohibit foreign national security and public safety threats from entering the United States.”
There are over 70 congressionally designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations. This differs from terrorist organizations designated by the executive branch through an executive order because Congress has to introduce and pass a resolution to reaffirm the executive branch’s designation.
For instance, Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, introduced legislation in February to designate drug cartels as Foreign Terrorist Organizations after President Donald Trump did so in 2025, but the bill has yet to be brought to the floor for a vote.
While the executive branch’s designation takes immediate effect, opening the door to military intervention, the congressional confirmation of the designation is seen as important as it shows that the executive branch maintains congressional approval of such military action.
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Additionally, due to the congressional passage of the Foreign Terrorist Organization List of 1990, Congress can also revoke an organization’s designation if lawmakers deem it inadmissible.
The amendment to declare that a terrorist designation from Congress does not constitute military action is only one of eight amendments to be introduced by Omar. The others include language to repeal the Alien Enemies Act, which Trump has invoked during his second term to deport suspected members of the Tren de Aragua drug cartel, as well as language to sever the U.S.-Israel military alliance.
The Worst of the Worst
Examples of Foreign Terrorist Organizations designated by Congress include Islamic organizations such as al-Qaeda, Hamas, and ISIS.
Hamas wrote in its 1988 founding documents that “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it.”
Meanwhile, ISIS has been responsible for numerous terrorist attacks against the West. In 2015, for example, several ISIS fighters opened fire and carried out suicide bombings in Paris, claiming the lives of 129 people and injuring 352.
Other groups designated by Congress as Foreign Terrorist Organizations include the Sinaloa Cartel, which is responsible for nearly 600 homicides in June of 2025 alone, and for trafficking illicit drugs and weapons to the United States.
During Trump’s second administration, the Pentagon has directed military forces to specifically carry out operations targeting groups and officials from these terrorist organizations abroad. Such operations include numerous strikes on drug smuggling boats heading from Latin America to the United States last fall, which have killed at least of 27 suspected smugglers.
As noted by the Council on Foreign Relations, other operations include the bombing targets in Iraq, Nigeria, and Somalia, and retaliatory strikes against Houthi militants in Yemen, after they had targeted U.S. service members in Syria.
O’Brien told the Daily Signal that the amendment will also apply to congressionally designated state sponsors of terrorism, such as the Islamic regime in Iran.
“It would also apply any time the president issues a formal proclamation declaring that a nation designated a state sponsor of terrorism, or its agents, are threatening or perpetrating hostilities against, or incursions into, the U.S. as specified in the AEA,” the former immigration judge added.
While Omar did not respond to the Daily Signal’s request for comment, in the spring she was one of 53 House Democrats to vote against a measure to designate Iran as a state sponsor of terror.
Hezbollah, Hamas, and Yemen’s Houthi rebels are believed to be funded by the Iranian regime.
Omar Wants to Repeal Alien Enemies Act
Other amendments that aim to repeal the Alien Enemies Act, such as Amendment #1152, would further restrict the executive branch’s authority if enacted.
That act, which Congress delegated to the president in 1798 to prevent foreign espionage and sabotage, currently grants the president authority to apprehend, restrain, and deport noncitizens from hostile nations without standard immigration hearings.
If repealed, the president would no longer have that authority.
Critics such as O’Brien argue that if Omar is successful, it would likely have little effect on the validity of deportation orders entered against illegal aliens and violent gang members.
“Virtually every alien who has been removed pursuant to the provisions of the AEA was also subject to removal under multiple other grounds,” O’Brien told the Daily Signal. “Moreover, the AEA does not create any unique bases for removal. Rather, in certain limited circumstances, it enables expedited removal of aliens who are hostile to the national security interests of the United States.”
For instance, after Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act during his second term to expedite the deportation of Venezuelan nationals he claimed were members of the Tren de Aragua drug cartel, he was met with lawsuits from civil rights organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union Justice Association. He also received criticism from members of Congress like Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-N.M., who claimed the president violated due process by expediting the deportation of the individuals before their day in court.
However, despite the pushback, the hundreds of deportations that proceeded the president’s invocation of the act in 2025 were still completed, and the aliens deported are no longer in the United States.
Israel in the Crosshairs
Other amendments Omar submitted, such as amendment #1177, which “repeals the War Reserve Stockpile Authority for Israel,” aim to end the U.S. military alliance with Israel, which has been warring against Hamas and other congressionally designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations in the Middle East. Israel also partnered with the United States in the war against Iran.
Since 2023, Israel has also claimed to have eliminated thousands of high-ranking officials of the Foreign Terrorist Organizations Hezbollah, Hamas, and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, who have murdered American and Israeli civilians.
While Omar did not provide a reason for wanting to limit U.S. military support for Israel in her initial press release, new surveys show that the majority of Democrats believe U.S. taxpayers spend too much on Israel. According to the Council on Foreign Relations, the United States has spent around 0.38% of its annual defense budget on Israel since Oct. 7, 2023.
Established in the 1990s, the War Reserve Stockpile Authority for Israel, or WRSA-I, serves to prevent delays in military resupply during conflicts. It mirrors a similar U.S. stockpile maintained in South Korea.
As stated by the Washington Institute, the stockpile acts as a pre-positioned “insurance policy” for rapid military resupply and has been accessed by Israel throughout its war against radical Islam.
As mentioned by the Israeli Policy Forum, Israel can withdraw weapons directly from these U.S.-owned depots in Israel. The weapons are later replenished or paid for through standard U.S. foreign military sales or emergency aid packages.
Since thousands of Hamas militants invaded Israel to kidnap, murder, and rape over 1,000 Israeli citizens on Oct. 7, 2023, Israel has accessed the stockpile to rearm rapidly.
The Israeli Defense Forces has since killed between 8,500 and 14,000 Hamas militants.
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