Constitutional Opinion No. 2026-0824
Case Information
- Content Scored
- S.Res. 778 (119th Congress) — Honoring Cambodian (FANK) Veterans Who Served Alongside U.S. Forces
- Source
- U.S. Senate
- Author
- Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA), with Sens. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Alex Padilla (D-CA)
- Publication Date
- 2026-06-18
- Content Type
- Legal / Normative Text
- Opinion Issued
- 2026-07-21
- AFCS Version
- 1.0
Holding
This is a commemorative resolution, and like all such measures it is thin on constitutional machinery — but where the sickle-cell resolution was largely orthogonal to the framework, this one leans genuinely aligned, because what it honors is exactly what the Standard honors: men who fought alongside American forces, stood against communism, and survived one of the century's great communist atrocities. It honors allies who served with the American Armed Forces — the FANK soldiers who fought beside U.S. forces and helped evacuate American Embassy personnel from Phnom Penh in the last hours of April 1975, a debt of loyalty a Standard that prizes those who stand with America is right to acknowledge (Articles XVI, I). It bears witness to the evil of communist totalitarianism — naming the Khmer Rouge genocide that murdered as many as three million people (Article XVIII). And it honors the founders' tradition of refuge for anti-communist allies — the FANK veterans who fled the killing fields, resettled in America, and contributed to their new communities (Article XI). The honest limits: this is a foreign-focused honorific centered on a foreign fighting force, but the resolution ties them throughout to their support of the United States and their subsequent lives as Americans, keeping the focus on the American connection, and it commits not a dollar and not a soldier — pure recognition, carrying none of the fiscal or interventionist tensions that tempered the operational measures in this run. What holds it in the solid-but-not-high band is simply that it is symbolic: a worthy act of remembrance rather than a constitutional or policy achievement. Tier 1 nets to 70; under the Legal/Normative weighting the result is 72 — Mostly America First.
It is the judgment of this Court that Opinion No. 2026-0824 is hereby entered into the record, in accordance with the America First Constitutional Standard. The score stands. The reasoning is published. The record is public.