Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) received hostility at a town hall in San Francisco on Monday when she said that President Donald Trump's decision to order a military strike against a Syrian airbase on April 6 was constitutional.
A constituent asked Feinstein what she could do to make sure that the United States does not get involved in multiple wars, prompting her to address the various threats the United States currently faces. She began by commenting on the dangers of North Korea's nuclear capabilities before pivoting to Syria.
"The number two problem of course is Syria, and that comes from a very different part of the Earth where you have Russia and Iran vying for placement in this area," Feinstein said. "You have a Sunni-Shia conflict in this area, and you have a despot as a leader who has participated in the killing of a half a million of his own people."
She then went on to reference the chemical weapons attack that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad waged against the Syrian people, crossing the "red line" that former President Barack Obama drew but never enforced.
The town hall crowd started getting irritated when Feinstein went into detail about sarin, the gas that was used in the chemical weapon.
"Answer the question," one woman yelled.
"How many wars do we have?" a man asked.
Others shouted until Feinstein addressed Trump's military response to the chemical attack.
"This new president has taken a step and that step was to send a number of Tomahawk missiles into an airport where planes left to drop the gas," Feinstein said, while getting heckled and booed by members of the audience.
Feinstein then defended the constitutionality of Trump's Syria missile strike.
"Under our Constitution, the president has 60 days to take a military action without the approval of the Congress," she concluded. "So this president now needs to put together a strategy and come to the Congress before he does anything else with a strategy."
Feinstein's comments come in direct conflict with her Democratic colleague, Sen. Chris Murphy (D., Conn.), who called Trump's missile strike "illegal" last Thursday during an interview on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," according to the Washington Free Beacon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPGh5BPfoJQ