Growing Movement for Afghanistan Drawdown Sends Message to the White House

Washington, DC -- The Campaign for America’s Future, MoveOn.Org, CREDO, Brave New Foundation, WinWithoutWar.org, and USACTION sent 250,000 signatures to the White House encouraging a swift drawdown of U.S. military presence in Afghanistan.

Roger Hickey, co-director of the Campaign for America’s Future said, “Osama Bin Laden is dead and the pressure is building from Americans who realize we cannot afford this huge military action in Afghanistan. At $10 billion dollars a month, the price is too high, and the mission is too unclear.”

Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-ME), a leader in the effort to draw attention to the cost of the ten year effort in Afghanistan said, “Early on, President Obama committed to getting Osama bin Laden and committed to an accelerated withdrawal from Afghanistan starting in July. He has lived up to that first commitment. Now, I urge him to follow through on that second commitment. We need to stand with him—give him support so he can stick to that.”

Similar petitions were circulated by The Campaign for America’s Future, MoveOn.Org, CREDO, Brave New Foundation, WinWithoutWar.org, and USACTION over the past several weeks and the groups joined to deliver a total of 250,000 collected signatures to the White House.

Campaign for America’s Future’s petition reads:

“We the undersigned urge the President and Congress of the United States to end our
military involvement in Afghanistan as fast as possible, and use the savings to restore
the American economy.

After the death of Osama bin Laden, we have fulfilled the objective that took us into
Afghanistan. But we have not completed our economic mission at home.

We cannot afford to continue spending over $10 billion a month and sacrificing American
lives in an endless quagmire with no remaining clear objective, when we desperately
need to create jobs revitalizing our infrastructure, generating clean energy and educating our kids.

We salute the brave efforts of our military forces. It's time to bring them home, and rebuild their home.”