Post #5251

🇺🇸 Trump’s Iran War, Congress’s Theater: Briefings, War Powers, and DHS as Hostage Congress is sprinting to look “in the loop” on a war it didn’t authorize and so far can’t stop. Staff briefings are being hurriedly arranged for key House and Senate committees this weekend, with all‑member classified sessions likely next week — after Trump has already launched major strikes on Iran, killed the supreme leader, and promised “major combat operations” with no clear endgame. ​ Democratic leaders are demanding more than PowerPoints. Chuck Schumer wants open hearings and public testimony, warning that the administration hasn’t given “critical details about the scope and immediacy of the threat,” while Hakeem Jeffries didn’t even get the pre‑strike Gang of Eight call that Rubio placed to Republican leaders. House and Senate Democrats are lining up behind war‑powers resolutions to force votes next week on curbing Trump’s freedom to escalate without Hill sign‑off, even as Speaker Mike Johnson and John Thune refuse to recall Congress early. ​ The reactions split almost perfectly along the now‑familiar fracture lines. On the right, leadership Republicans and longtime Iran hawks like Lindsey Graham and Rick Crawford hail the joint U.S.–Israel operation as “necessary,” “long justified,” and proof of “peace through strength,” with Graham declaring “the end of the largest state sponsor of terrorism is upon us.” On the left and center, figures like Ruben Gallego, Mark Warner and Jim Himes call it “a war of choice with no strategic endgame” that risks dragging the U.S. into yet another open‑ended Middle East conflict, insisting America can back Iran’s democracy movement “without sending our troops to die.” ​ And because Washington never wastes a war, Republicans are already folding the Iran strikes into an unrelated fight over a partially shut‑down Department of Homeland Security, arguing that the new conflict proves Democrats must swallow their demands and fully fund DHS “at maximum readiness.” The pattern is as old as the War Powers Act: the president moves first, Congress scrambles for a briefing, leadership games out how to weaponize the crisis for domestic leverage — and only then do lawmakers remember they were supposed to be the ones deciding whether there would be a war in the first place. ​ #Iran#Trump#Congress#WarPowers#Netanyahu#LindseyGraham#Schumer#Gallego 📱American Оbserver - Stay up to date on all important events 🇺🇸