US Senate Votes to Stop Aid to Saudi in Yemen
On Thursday the US Senate voted to halt American military support for Saudi Arabia’s devastating Proxy war in Yemen.
This resolution was followed by a second almost unanimous vote to condemn the Saudi Crown Prince for the killing of Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi.
Senate members Bernie Sanders, Chris Murphy and Mike Lee, key sponsors of the resolution, have been sourcing support for over a year.
Sanders and Murphy explain that the they gained more bipartisan momentum for the resolution following the Saudi bomb attack on Yemeni Children riding a school bus and the Saudi government-sanctioned killing of Khashoggi in October.
The 56-41 vote is the first time Senate used their powers to demand an end to military actions since the 1973 War Powers Act. The U.S. President and House will still have to review the resolution and sign it into action.
Oregon Could Ban Single Family Zoning
Oregon House Speaker Tina Kotek is currently working on a proposal to end single family zoning restrictions.
It would cause all cities in Oregon with a population of ten thousand or higher to allow more than four homes to be built on land protected by single family zoning laws.
These zoning laws come from a 1924 ban on attached housing in certain neighborhoods which occurred after the Klu Klux Klan gained several electoral positions in Oregon including the House Speaker and Multnomah County Commission in 1922.
In 1921 a White House task force made up of outspoken segregationists formed to push zoning regulations on U.S cities. This was the political climate when the first single family zoning law in Portland was passed. In 1959 Portland expanded the ban to almost every neighborhood in the city. By 2018, the highest income neighborhoods include many of the original neighborhoods of the 1924 zoning law.
- KBOO