House Passes Bill Allowing 9/11 Lawsuits Against Saudi Arabia; White House Hints at Veto

The House on Friday approved a bill to allow families of those killed in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to sue Saudi Arabia for any role in the terrorist plot, setting up a rare bipartisan showdown with the White House.

The measure was never debated on the House or Senate floors. It reflects a growing desire to re-examine Washington’s alliance with the kingdom, which for decades has been a cornerstone of American foreign policy in the Middle East. Other measures, like a bipartisan one that would seek to block the sale of some tanks to the kingdom, are also on the horizon.

But President Obama says he is strongly opposed to the measure, and the White House has signaled that he would veto it.

Lawmakers felt intense pressure from families of the victims of the attacks, who wanted the legislation passed before the 15th anniversary of 9/11 on Sunday. That may account for the bill jumping from a committee room to an expedited vote on the House floor.

“The families have been asking for this for over a decade,” said Terry Strada, whose husband, Thomas S. Strada, was killed in the attack on the World Trade Center towers. She has long lobbied Congress on the issue. “We don’t feel this is fast-track in any way, shape or form,” she said.

Mr. Obama has voiced opposition to the effort for months, fearing that it could expose the United States to lawsuits by people in other countries. A White House official said this week that the administration’s position has not changed even after some changes were made to the bill to mollify critics.

The bill “is a politically cost-free way for Congress to send a signal of seeming seriousness about terrorism on the dawn of the 15th anniversary of 9/11,” said Jack Goldsmith, a professor of law at Harvard who served in the Department of Justice under President George W. Bush.

The bill addresses a 1976 law that gives other countries broad immunity from American lawsuits.

The administration has argued that it would put Americans at legal risk overseas. That position seemed at least somewhat validated when Pierre Lellouche, a member of the French Parliament who is chairman of the rough equivalent in France of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he would pursue legislation that would permit French citizens to sue the United States with cause.

“I have sympathy with the notion of hitting those countries which actively support terrorism,” Mr. Lellouche said Friday. But the American bill “will cause a legal revolution in international law with major political consequences.”

The Saudi government, which has denied any involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks, has warned that it might liquidate hundreds of billions of dollars worth of American assets if the bill becomes law, which many experts believe to be a false threat.

Several Republicans moved to block the bill in the Senate, but it ultimately sailed through by unanimous consent.

In May, after visiting Saudi Arabia, Speaker Paul D. Ryan warned that Congress ought to make sure “we’re not making mistakes with our allies.” The Obama administration had counted on a firewall in the House against the bill. But Mr. Ryan was recently in New York where he saw many 9/11 families who pressed him to move forward.

To make the bill more palatable to critics, lawmakers added a provision that would allow the executive branch to halt the litigation if it proves in court that its members were engaged in good-faith settlement negotiation with a nation, preserving the executive branch’s purview over foreign policy while still giving a pathway for family members to sue.

Based on the vote totals in the House and Senate, Congress has enough votes to override a veto should Mr. Obama issue one.

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