{"id":4310,"date":"2026-03-05T05:13:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T05:13:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/4310\/"},"modified":"2026-03-05T05:13:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T05:13:12","slug":"senate-republicans-vote-down-legislation-to-halt-iran-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/4310\/","title":{"rendered":"Senate Republicans vote down legislation to halt Iran war"},"content":{"rendered":"

Senate Republicans voted down an effort Wednesday to halt President Donald Trump\u2019s war against Iran, demonstrating early support for a conflict that has rapidly spread across the Middle East with no clear U.S. exit strategy.<\/p>\n

The legislation, known as a war powers resolution, failed on a 47-53 vote tally. The vote fell mostly along party lines, though Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky voted in favor and Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania voted against.<\/p>\n

The war powers resolution gave lawmakers an opportunity to demand congressional approval before any further attacks are carried out. The vote forced them to take a stand on a war shaping the fate of U.S. military members, countless other lives and the future of the region.<\/p>\n

Underscoring the gravity of the moment, Democratic senators filled the Senate chamber and sat at their desks as the voting got underway. Typically, senators step into the chamber to cast their vote, then leave.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday every senator \u2014 every single one \u2014 will pick a side,\u201d Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said before the vote. \u201cDo you stand with the American people who are exhausted with forever wars in the Middle East or stand with Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth as they bumble us headfirst into another war?\u201d<\/p>\n

Sen. John Barrasso, second in Senate Republican leadership, said during the debate that GOP senators were sending a message that Democrats are wrong for forcing a vote on the war powers resolution.<\/p>\n

\u201cDemocrats would rather obstruct Donald Trump than obliterate Iran\u2019s national nuclear program,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Trump administration scrambles for congressional support<\/p>\n

After launching a surprise attack against Iran on Saturday, Trump has scrambled to win support for a conflict that Americans of all political persuasions were already wary of entering. Trump administration officials have been a frequent presence on Capitol Hill this week as they try to reassure lawmakers that they have the situation under control.<\/p>\n

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Wednesday that the war could extend eight weeks, a longer time frame than has previously been floated by the Trump administration. He also acknowledged that Iran is still able to carry out missile attacks even as the U.S. tries to control the country\u2019s airspace.<\/p>\n

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U.S. service members \u201cremain in harm\u2019s way, and we must be clear-eyed that the risk is still high,\u201d Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at the same press conference.<\/p>\n

Six U.S. military members were killed<\/a> over the weekend in a drone strike in Kuwait.<\/p>\n

Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa acknowledged the human costs of the war in her floor speech. Two of the soldiers killed Sunday were from Iowa and a National Guard unit from her state was also attacked in Syria in December, resulting in the deaths of two other soldiers.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut now is our opportunity to bring an end to the decades of chaos,\u201d said Ernst, who herself served as an officer in the Iowa National Guard for two decades.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe sooner the better,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

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Trump has also not ruled out deploying U.S. ground troops. He has said he is hoping to end the bombing campaign within a few weeks, but his goals for the war have shifted from regime change to stopping Iran from developing nuclear capabilities to crippling its navy and missile programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should be careful about opening a door into chaos in the Middle East when we cannot see the other side of it,\u201d Democratic Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware said in a solemn floor speech after the vote concluded.<\/p>\n

He said he was praying for \u201cgrace to find a path forward together where more do not needlessly join those who have already fallen in this new war in the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lawmakers go on record<\/p>\n

The votes in Congress this week represented potentially consequential markers of just where lawmakers stand on the war as they look ahead to midterm elections and the consequences of the conflict.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody gets to hide and give the president an easy pass or an end-run around the Constitution,\u201d said Sen. Tim Kaine, the Virginia Democrat leading the war powers resolution.<\/p>\n

Republican leaders have successfully, though narrowly, defeated a series of war powers resolutions pertaining to several other conflicts that Trump has entered or threatened to enter. This one, however, was different.<\/p>\n

Unlike Trump\u2019s military campaigns against alleged drug boats or even Venezuelan leader Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, the attack on Iran represents an open-ended conflict that is already ricocheting across the region. Several senators who have voted for previous war powers resolutions noted that they opposed this one because it applied to a conflict that is already raging.<\/p>\n

\u201cPassing this resolution now would send the wrong message to Iran and to our troops,\u201d said GOP Sen. Susan Collins of Maine. \u201cAt this juncture, providing unequivocal support to our service members is critically important, as is ongoing consultation by the administration with Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n

House vote looms<\/p>\n

On the other side of the Capitol, an intense debate over the war unfolded before a vote Thursday. The House first debated a resolution presented by GOP leadership affirming that Iran is the world\u2019s largest state sponsor of terrorism.<\/p>\n

Rep. Brian Mast, the GOP chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, publicly thanked Trump for taking action against Iran, saying the president is using his own constitutional authority to defend the U.S. against the \u201cimminent threat\u201d of Iran.<\/p>\n

Mast, an Army veteran who worked as a bomb disposal expert in Afghanistan, said the Democratic resolution was effectively asking \u201cthat the president do nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rep. Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs panel, said before the debate that the hardest votes he has taken in Congress have been to decide whether to send U.S. troops to war. \u201cOur young men and women\u2019s lives are on the line,\u201d he said, his voice showing emotion as he emerged from a closed-door briefing late Tuesday with Trump officials.<\/p>\n

At a news conference Wednesday, several Democratic members who are also veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars spoke about the heavy costs of those conflicts.<\/p>\n

One of them was Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo. \u201cI learned when I was fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, that when elites in Washington bang the war drums, pound their chest, talk about the costs of war and act tough, they\u2019re not talking about them doing it, they\u2019re not talking about their kids,\u201d Crow said. \u201cThey\u2019re talking about working class kids like us.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Senate Republicans voted down an effort Wednesday to halt President Donald Trump\u2019s war against Iran, demonstrating early support…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4311,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3094,3092,2698,2539,2932,2933,1529,1528,467,978,38,1917,3091,34,196,1867,2789,3089,3090,35,49,2540,772,3088,1289,3093,1913,1988],"class_list":{"0":"post-4310","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-iran","8":"tag-brian-mast","9":"tag-chris-coons","10":"tag-chuck-schumer","11":"tag-circulated-air-force-times","12":"tag-circulated-army-times","13":"tag-circulated-marine-corps-times","14":"tag-circulated-military-times","15":"tag-circulated-navy-times","16":"tag-congress","17":"tag-dan-caine","18":"tag-donald-trump","19":"tag-gregory-meeks","20":"tag-iowa-national-guard","21":"tag-iran","22":"tag-iran-war","23":"tag-jason-crow","24":"tag-john-fetterman","25":"tag-john-barrasso","26":"tag-joni-ernst","27":"tag-kuwait","28":"tag-middle-east","29":"tag-military-times","30":"tag-pete-hegseth","31":"tag-rand-paul","32":"tag-senate","33":"tag-susan-collins","34":"tag-tim-kaine","35":"tag-war-powers-resolution"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116174861340172745","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4310\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}