White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough appeared on all five Sunday shows to make the case for a limited airstrike in Syria.
"The risks of inaction, outweigh the risk of action. [Assad] is a person who has gone from using overwhelming conventional force, to using napalm on children, to now using chemical weapons with a scale and scope we have not seen in nearly three decades," McDonough said during an appearance on "Fox News Sunday."
"This [U.S. strike] is about a series of very important things," McDonough told NBC’s "Meet the Press," including defending the international standard against the use of chemical weapons.
"Our troops have not been subjected to chemical weapon attacks since World War I … and we have to make sure that for the sake of our guys, our men and women on the frontlines, that we reinforce this prohibition," he said.
The administration continues to attempt to convince a skeptical Congress, and public, that intervening in Syria is the right decision for the United States.
The majority of lawmakers appear to be opposed to the president’s resolution for intervention. The Washington Post reported that, at the end of last week, 223 members are "in the ‘no’ or ‘leaning no’ category."
Appearing on "Fox News Sunday," Senator Rand Paul (R., Ky.) explained the bind the administration is in.
"The most difficult obstacle they have to overcome, is that if we go in we’ll be going in on the side of al-Qaeda," he said. "I don’t know if it’ll pass in the House though, I really have my doubts about whether it passes in the House."
There has been much speculation as to whether or not the president would go ahead with the strike in the event Congress votes down his resolution. The administration has made it clear that the president has the power to do so.
Paul sees that as a non-starter.
"I will insist that there is full debate on this and I will insist that I get an amendment, and my amendment will say that the vote is binding. That the President cannot, if we vote him down, decide to go to war anyways," Paul said.
Paul’s concern stems from what critics have called a lack of clarity in regards to who’s fighting against the regime.
Lawmakers such as Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Tex.), Rep. Justin Amash (R., Mich.), and Sen. Tom Udall (D., N.M.) reiterated their opposition for similar reasons this weekend.
The White House contends this is a nonissue.
"I’m outraged for somebody to suggest that our people would be serving as allies to al-Qaeda," McDonough said. This "is very clear, targeted, consequential, limited attack against Assad forces and Assad capabilities so that he is deterred from carrying out these action again."
"Here’s what it is not," McDonough said on "This Week." "It is not boots on the ground. It is not an extended air campaign. It is not Iraq, Afghanistan, or Libya."
Rep. Mike Rogers (R., Mich.) said on CBS’s "Face the Nation" that national security is at stake.
"I believe that great adage of peace through strength, and we’ve lost that," Rogers said. "Right now the United States of America doesn’t have the credibility to go to the opposition and say, stop shooting, we’re going to negotiate with Assad."
Rogers, who supports the strike, said inaction would have repercussions on our dealings with other recalcitrant regimes.
"I think that this is an important piece of America’s national security moving forward, and it does mean our relationship with Russia, it does mean do we get a nuclear Iran or not, can we contain North Korea and its efforts," he said. "The decisions we make here will impact those decisions that those countries make on the use of these kinds of weapons."
Sens. John McCain (R., Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) have joined some leading conservatives in pointing to the strike as an inadequate step that does not go far enough.
McDonough said on "Meet the Press" that "not a single member of Congress has rebutted the intelligence."
The Senate is expected to vote on the resolution in the coming days. It is unclear when and if the House will hold their vote. Last week, a top congressional aide told the Free Beacon that if they do not have the votes, there is a possibility House leadership may take the resolution off the floor.
President Barack Obama will address the nation Tuesday evening.