US House rejects war powers resolution, backs Trump's Operation Epic Fury

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - WASHINGTON — The US House of Representatives narrowly rejected a war powers resolution Thursday to halt President Donald Trump’s attacks on Iran.
A bipartisan resolution led by Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., failed to pass after four Democrats joined most Republicans in sinking it.
The legislation was aimed at blocking Trump from using the Armed Forces in the joint US-Israeli operation in Iran, which would likely force the strikes to grind to a halt.
The Trump administration, as well as the majority of Republicans in Congress, have insisted that the president has acted within his authority so far and are hopeful he will continue to do so.
But Democrats, along with Massie and Rep. Warren Davidson, R-Ohio, are largely skeptical. Both Republicans voted in favor of the measure.
"The Ayatollah was not a president. He was a religious leader from a region notorious for radical Islamists and the United States and Israel turned him into a martyr," Massie said during debate on the resolution. "If Congress wants war, then the speaker should hold a vote to declare it."
Davidson said Wednesday, "The moral hazard posed by a government no longer constrained by our Constitution is a grave threat."
The Democrats who voted against reining in Trump's war powers include Reps. Jared Golden, D-Maine, Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, and Greg Landsman, D-Ohio.
It’s the second vote in as many days, after the Senate defeated a similar measure. Lawmakers are confronting the sudden reality of representing wary Americans in wartime and all that entails — with lives lost, dollars spent and alliances tested by a president’s unilateral decision to go to war with Iran.
While the tally in the House, 212-219, was expected to be tight, the outcome provided a clarifying snapshot of political support for, and opposition to, the US-Israel military operation and Trump’s rationale for bypassing Congress, which alone has the power to declare war.
At the Capitol, the conflict has quickly carried echoes of the long wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and many Sept. 11-era veterans now serve in Congress.
“Donald Trump is not a king, and if he believes the war with Iran is in our national interest, then he must come to Congress and make the case,” said Rep. Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
House Speaker Mike Johnson warned that it would be “dangerous” to limit the president’s authority while the US military is already in conflict.
“We are not at war,” said Johnson, R-Louisiana, a close ally of Trump, contradicting others. He said the operation is limited in scope and duration, and the “mission is nearly accomplished.”

Advertisements Trump’s Republican Party largely sees the conflict with Iran not as the start of a new war, but the end of a government that has long menaced the West. The operation has killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, which some view as an opportunity for regime change, though others warn of a chaotic power vacuum.
Republican Rep. Brian Mast of Florida, 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 US against the “imminent threat” the country posed.
Mast, an Army veteran who worked as a bomb disposal expert in Afghanistan, said the war powers resolution was effectively asking “that the president do nothing.”
For Democrats, Trump’s attack on Iran, influenced by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, is a war of choice that is testing the balance of powers in the Constitution.
“The framers weren’t fooling around,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., arguing that the Constitution is clear that only Congress can decide matters of war. “It’s up to us.”
Crossover coalitions emerged among those in Congress. Two Republicans joined most Democrats in voting for the war powers resolution, while four Democrats joined Republicans to reject it.
Trump has scrambled to win support for the nearly week-old conflict as Americans of all political persuasions take stock. Administration officials spent hours behind closed doors on Capitol Hill this week trying to reassure lawmakers that they have the situation under control.
Six US military members were killed over the weekend in a drone strike in Kuwait, and Trump has said more Americans could die. Thousands of Americans abroad have scrambled for flights, many lighting up phone lines at congressional offices as they sought help trying to flee the Middle East.
Trump said Thursday he must be involved in choosing Iran’s new leader. Yet Johnson said this week that America has enough problems at home and is not about to be in the “nation-building business.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that the war could extend eight weeks, twice as long as the president first estimated. Trump has left open the possibility of sending US troops into what has largely been a bombing campaign. — Agencies