Families of 9/11 victims are infuriated that the Obama administration is lobbying hard against a bill that could result in Saudi Arabia being held responsible in U.S. courts for Sept. 11, 2001.
Saudi Arabia is threatening to dump hundreds of billions of dollars of U.S. assets if Congress passes the law, which would make it easier for Americans to win lawsuits against Saudis implicated in the 9/11 attacks, reports The New York Times. The Saudi foreign minister personally visited Washington last month and told lawmakers Saudi Arabia would be forced to sell up to $750 billion in treasury securities and other assets if the law passes, because of the potential for U.S. courts to freeze the assets on behalf of 9/11 families.
The Senate bill would revise immunity laws currently sheltering Saudis from American lawsuits in U.S. courts, and has rare bipartisan support. President Barack Obama is lobbying so vigorously against the bill he’s infuriating lawmakers and families of 9/11 victims.
“It’s stunning to think that our government would back the Saudis over its own citizens,” Mindy Kleinberg, part of a group of 9/11 victims’ families backing the bill, told TheNYT.
Economists have pointed out the unlikelihood of Saudi Arabia following through on the threat to dump U.S. assets, because its own currency would suffer from the resulting economic turmoil since it is tied to the dollar, and because it would be very hard to pull off on such a large scale.
“The only way they could punish us is by punishing themselves,” economist Edwin Truman told TheNYT.
In addition to economic retaliation, the administration is worried other countries could change their immunity laws in response in a way that could jeopardize Americans and hurt U.S. interests. Secretary of State John Kerry has warned the Senate that the bill would expose the U.S. to lawsuits abroad that would “take away our sovereign immunity and create a terrible precedent.”
Department of State spokesman John Kirby told TheNYT the administration stands by the 9/11 victims and their families.
Saudi officials living in the U.S. are believed to have played a role in the 9/11 attacks, although the 9/11 Commission stated no evidence was found implicating “senior” officials or the government itself. Twenty-eight unpublished pages from the Commission report, however, are suspected to contain evidence implicating Saudi Arabia and more details on their involvement.
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