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1st Ld Writethru: U.S. Senate votes to override Obama's veto of 9/11 lawsuit bill

Xinhua, September 29, 2016 Adjust font size:

U.S. Senate on Wednesday voted to override President Barack Obama's veto of a bill allowing the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks to sue Saudi Arabia.

Senators voted 97-1 to override Obama's veto. The only vote in favor of Obama's position came from Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid.

The vote marked the first time during Obama's presidency that his veto is overridden by the Senate. The House of Representatives will take up the matter later on Wednesday.

House Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters last week that he expected that there would be enough votes for an override, according to news website The Hill.

The bill, named Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA), would remove the sovereign immunity in U.S. courts from Saudi government, which is not designated state sponsor of terrorism by the United States.

Obama vetoed the bill on Friday, arguing in a letter to the Senate that he made the decision because the bill "would be detrimental to U.S. national interests."

"Enacting JASTA into law, however, would neither protect Americans from terrorist attacks nor improve the effectiveness of our response to such attacks," Obama said.

Families of the Sept. 11 victims have been trying to sue the Saudi royal family, Saudi banks and charities in U.S. courts, on ground that the Saudi government provided financial support for terrorism.

Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks which killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Washington D.C. area and Pennsylvania, was a wealthy Saudi national.

But the families' efforts have largely been stymied, in part because of a 1976 law that gives foreign nations some immunity from lawsuits in American courts.

The JASTA has already drawn strong criticism from the Saudi government, a close U.S. partner in fighting terrorism in the Middle East, which has denied any role in the plot of the 2001 terror attacks.

Saudi Arabia has also threatened to sell off hundreds of billions of dollars' worth of American assets held by the kingdom if the U.S. passes and enacts the bill. Enditem