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Senate Democrats scored another win in pushing back against President Donald Trump’s war in Iran on Tuesday, but the symbolic victory won’t actually curb his war powers in the region.
Aided by absences from Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Dave McCormick, R-Pa., Democrats and a handful of Republicans passed a war powers resolution rebuking the conflict in Iran. It’s the same resolution that passed the House earlier this month in a rare display of House Republicans breaking with Trump.
Sens. Rand Paul, R-Ky., Susan Collins, R-Maine, Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Bill Cassidy, R-La., joined nearly every Senate Democrat to adopt the resolution on a 50 to 48 vote.
But unlike several previous attempts in the Senate to curb Trump’s authority, the House-passed measure does not carry any legally binding weight and won’t go to the president’s desk for his signature, where it would likely be vetoed.
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Still, after stumbling last week, Democrats notched another victory against the war.
The vote comes as Congress reels over the memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed between the U.S. and Iran that, for now, has allotted more time for officials to negotiate a longer-lasting peace deal.
Many Republicans recoiled at the drip-feed of information coming out about the deal, with some comparing it to former President Barack Obama’s own Iran nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Roger Wicker, R-Miss., shredded the MOU in a statement Thursday in which he cautioned that the agreement “negotiates away the victories of Operation Epic Fury in ways that are completely out of step with the president’s goals.”
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Wicker took particular issue with the proposed $300 billion reconstruction fund, which he acknowledged wouldn’t be funded by taxpayers, but “would make Iran’s payoff under President Obama’s 2015 deal look like a pittance by comparison.”
Other Republicans aren’t thrilled with sanctions on Iranian oil being lifted, even temporarily, after years of keeping their oil business in a vice grip.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said he wanted to “tie lifting sanctions or financial incentives to conditions on Iranian behavior,” and acknowledged that reopening the Strait of Hormuz was a component of that.
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But he also said that the “objective here is always going to be Iranian compliance” with ending their nuclear program in exchange for financial incentives. And if the final deal does include an agreement touching Iran’s nuclear program, lawmakers will get to vote on it.
Congress is also gearing up to mull an $80 billion supplemental spending request from the Pentagon to cover the costs of the war, a figure that’s more than double what War Secretary Pete Hegseth and the Pentagon comptroller told lawmakers during a hearing earlier this year.
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Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., argued that as the MOU takes hold, now is the “perfect time for Congress to step back and ask ourselves the question of what should the next chapter be, rather than allowing one man to make that decision.”
“If you have to come to us for diplomacy, and you have to come to us for money, you shouldn’t be able to end-run us to initiate war on our own,” Kaine said.
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