By Ron Nissimov
Houston Chronicle
December 16, 2003
U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, said Monday that the capture of Saddam Hussein does nothing to change her opposition to the war in Iraq.
"I believe we should have had a congressional vote before declaring war, and we should have allowed U.N. inspectors time to finish their work," Jackson Lee said during a news conference at Bush Intercontinental Airport. "As to WMDs (weapons of mass destruction), the fact they have not been found I believe shows I was right."
One of the more outspoken congressional critics of the war in Iraq, Jackson Lee returned to Houston from a recent terrorism fact-finding mission to Europe and the Middle East. She and nine other members of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security met with officials in Spain, Italy, Syria and Israel, she said.
She praised troops from the 4th Infantry Division based at Fort Hood for catching the former Iraqi dictator Saturday in an underground hide-out at a farmhouse south of Tikrit. She said Saddam's capture presents an opportunity for the United States to form a broader international coalition to implement and maintain a peaceful government in Iraq. She also called for international participation in Saddam's trial.
Jackson Lee said she was so impressed with Syrian President Bashar Assad during her visit that she invited him to speak in Texas, even though his country is designated by the United States as a rogue state and a sponsor of terrorism.
"I'm sure someone will write a headline, `Congresswoman invites a terrorist'," Jackson Lee said. "But that's not what I'm trying to do."
She said Assad showed his willingness to negotiate by meeting despite President Bush's signing on Friday of the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003, which could impose sanctions on Syria.
"He's a 39-year-old president who even gave us a picture of him and his children," Jackson Lee said. "Let's see what he can do. He's not his father," a reference to Hafez Assad, who ruled Syria with an iron grip for 30 years before his death in 2000.