By Emily Cadei and Alan K. Ota, CQ Staff

Both the House and Senate are moving to stake out positions on U.S. involvement in Libya, although they may end up with different outcomes.

Senate Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass., and the Armed Services Committee’s top Republican, John McCain of Arizona, introduced a joint resolution Tuesday that would authorize U.S. participation in the NATO-led military operation in Libya for the next year. The resolution explicitly opposes the introduction of ground troops.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the resolution — which has a long bipartisan roster of backers — has the votes necessary for Senate adoption.

House Republican leaders offered two resolutions Tuesday. One echoes the Senate measure and would authorize the operation. The second would demand the removal of U.S. forces from all hostilities in Libya, except for those forces engaged in refueling, search and rescue, surveillance, intelligence, reconnaissance and other non-combat missions.

“If the commander in chief believes that intervention in Libya is important for our national security, he has a responsibility to make a case for it — clearly and publicly — and seek authorization. In the three months since military action in Libya began, none of this has occurred,” Speaker John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, said in a written statement. “The American people deserve to have their voice heard in this debate, and Congress has a responsibility to hold the White House accountable.”

Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., suggested the House may not be inclined to endorse the operation. “Members are frustrated. I’m frustrated,” Cantor told reporters. “The onus is on the president to put forward why we’re there. He has still not, I think, adequately done that. He has still not responded to so many of our concerns that we are involved in hostilities there.”

Other lawmakers are preparing to offer amendments to the fiscal 2012 Defense appropriations bill (HR 2219) on the House floor later this week in an effort to block funding of future military action in Libya.

Anger over the Obama administration’s refusal to seek congressional authorization for the involvement in Libya reached a new high last week. The administration distributed a report that provided additional detail on the military’s operations but also argued that the U.S. role does not qualify as sending troops into “hostilities” and therefore does not require the formal blessing of Congress, as specified in the War Powers Resolution (PL 93-148).

Successive administrations, as well as some lawmakers, have maintained that the 1973 law is unconstitutional.

With a few exceptions, lawmakers rejected the White House argument. The backlash was particularly heated in the House, where critics forced a showdown last month on a measure (H Con Res 51) calling for a withdrawal of troops from Libya. The resolution, offered by Dennis J. Kucinich, D-Ohio, was defeated only after Boehner offered a less drastic alternative (H Res 292).

Up to this point, the Senate has also had difficulty building a consensus on Libya. But the list of cosponsors for the Kerry-McCain resolution — which includes Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill.; Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich.; Select Intelligence Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.; Minority Whip Jon Kyl, R-Ariz.; Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; and Roy Blunt, R-Mo. — signals that the ground is shifting.

The bipartisan measure (S Res 194) is a more assertive version of a nonbinding resolution Kerry and McCain introduced last month, which expressed support for U.S. intervention to prevent a humanitarian disaster.

The new language authorizes “limited use” of U.S. forces in Libya and reiterates that it is the goal of U.S. policy to force Muammar el-Qaddafi from power through the “use of diplomatic and economic pressure.” It also requires the administration to respond to a list of questions on the state of U.S. operations now and plans for the future.