Public Law 107-20 is the 2002′ AUMF authorizing military action against Saddam Hussein and Iraqi forces which, as you can see above, is referenced by Obama as his authorization to attack Syria.  (?)  No-where in 2002 was attacking Bashir Assad part of the discussion.
The White House is fully aware they do not have a legal basis to attack Syria.  Watch Tony Blinken obfuscate, deflect and attempt to reconcile the disparity.

Insufferably Chris Wallace does not call them out on it. Wallace rightly calls Blinken to task for using a 2002′ UAMF the White House itself has asked for repeal 2 months earlier.


But yet again, no-one is holding the administration to account for justifying it’s legal basis for actions inside Syria.
Worse yet, Wallace completely misses the natural follow-up:  If the 2002′ UAMF is the establishment law underpinning White House authority, then why did they want it repealed two months ago?
When Blinken says: “we still want it repealed“, Wallace could simply follow with ‘If they had done as you requested, you just lost your legal authorization – then what would you do”?
Blinken’s only viable response would be: if the 02′ UAMF was previously repealed, we would have requested 2014 authorization from congress.
Bringing the entire conversation back to where it should be in the first place.
President Obama going to congress and asking for pre-approval to conduct military strikes in both Syria and Iraq -the constitutional way- prior to launching those attacks; which had no basis for the elimination of an “immediate and imminent” threat.
Supportive airstrikes, to push-back ISIS, as requested by the Iraqi government could still have been taking place while a debate on Syrian intervention was going on.
Within that congressional debate the White House would have been exposed to years of hypocrisy saying the al-Qaeda threat was gone.    Such open embarrassment is why they choose “politically” not to do it.
… Hence, an illegal war