Congress refused to pull the leash. The House of Representatives voted 212-219 on Thursday to defeat a War Powers resolution aimed at curbing President Trump's military operations against Iran, one day after the Senate killed its own version 47-53.
Both chambers, across two votes in 48 hours, chose to let the commander-in-chief prosecute the campaign he launched over the weekend.
The House resolution, introduced by Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, and California Democrat Ro Khanna, couldn't survive the floor, the Daily Mail reported. Only two Republicans, Massie and Warren Davidson, voted in favor. Four Democrats crossed the aisle to vote no: Henry Cuellar of Texas, Jared Golden of Maine, Greg Landsman of Ohio, and Juan Vargas.
In the Senate, Democrat John Fetterman joined the Republican majority in blocking the upper chamber's resolution, which was pushed by Sens. Tim Kaine, Adam Schiff, Chuck Schumer, and, notably, Republican Rand Paul.
On Saturday, a joint U.S./Israeli operation targeted top Iranian military assets after nuclear negotiations between Washington and Tehran collapsed. Trump delivered an eight-minute address from Mar-a-Lago explaining that he ordered the strike to neutralize what he described as an imminent threat from the Iranian regime.
"Our objective is to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime, a vicious group of very hard, terrible people."
He did not sugarcoat the cost. Six American service members have been killed in the conflict so far, four of whom have been named. Trump acknowledged this directly:
"The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost and we may have casualties. That often happens in war. But we're doing this not for now, we're doing this for the future and it is a noble mission."
That kind of candor matters. The President connected the current operation to a broader record that includes the January capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro and the "Midnight Hammer" attack on Iranian nuclear facilities in June. He reiterated the core objective: the Iranian regime must never obtain a nuclear weapon. He pointed to Tehran's mass murder of its own protesters as evidence of the kind of government the world is dealing with.
Videos of Iranians shouting "thank you, Trump" reportedly spread across social media. Back in mid-January, Trump had promised those protesters that "help is on the way."
Democrats who pushed the War Powers resolutions framed the strikes as reckless overreach. Sen. Tim Kaine urged his colleagues to "vote to end this dangerous and unnecessary war," invoking Iraq and Afghanistan:
"We owe it to those in uniform, their families, and all Americans to not make the same mistakes that we made in Iraq and Afghanistan."
Sen. Adam Schiff described the situation as a "conflict with no clear objectives, no plan, and no authorization from Congress." He demanded that Trump come before the legislature and justify the expenditure of lives and billions.
These arguments sound principled until you remember who's making them. Schiff spent years insisting executive power was sacred when his party held the White House, and that congressional oversight was a dangerous Republican weapon when it targeted Democratic priorities. Now, oversight is a moral imperative again. Convenient timing.
The Iraq comparison is particularly hollow. The stated objective here is specific: prevent a hostile regime from acquiring nuclear weapons. Whether you agree with the method, the goal is not ambiguous. It is the opposite of the nation-building quagmires that defined the post-9/11 era. Kaine knows this. The framing is designed to trigger war fatigue, not illuminate the actual strategic picture.
The more intellectually honest opposition came from the right. Sen. Rand Paul argued on X that "the constitution conferred the power to declare or initiate war to Congress for a reason, to make war less likely." That is a serious constitutional argument, and it deserves serious engagement rather than dismissal.
Rep. Massie, who co-authored the House resolution, took a different tack entirely:
"PSA: Bombing a country on the other side of the globe won't make the Epstein files go away, any more than the Dow going above 50,000 will."
Massie, a lead advocate for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, wasn't making a war powers argument. He was making a distraction argument. It landed with his audience, but it didn't move votes.
The libertarian wing lost this round decisively. Two House Republicans and one Senate Republican broke ranks. That's it. The war powers challenge failed not because Congress was bullied into silence but because the overwhelming majority in both parties' caucuses, and a handful of Democrats, concluded the resolutions were the wrong move at the wrong time.
Democrats will point to polling. A Daily Mail/J.L. Partners survey showed Trump's approval at 44 percent, down four points since Friday, described as the lowest rating recorded in that outlet's tracking. A Reuters/Ipsos survey published Sunday found 43 percent disapprove of Trump's attack on Iran, while 29 percent remain undecided. About 56 percent of those surveyed said Trump's readiness to deploy military power is excessive.
These numbers tell a familiar story: Americans are instinctively wary of military engagement. That wariness is healthy. It is also not a strategy. Polls measured opposition to the Bin Laden raid in the days before it happened. Public opinion reflects mood, not intelligence briefings. Congress saw the briefings. Congress voted.
Speaker Mike Johnson framed the stakes plainly on Tuesday when he told reporters on Capitol Hill:
"Passage of a War Powers resolution right now would be a terrible, dangerous idea."
He was right, and the vote counts proved the argument carried. Passing a resolution to constrain military operations mid-campaign doesn't bring troops home. It signals to Tehran that Washington's resolve has an expiration date. Every adversary watching would have read a successful War Powers vote as an invitation to wait out the pressure.
Six service members are dead. Their sacrifice deserves a strategy carried to its conclusion, not a congressional debate designed to score political points against a president Democrats already opposed before the first strike landed. Kaine, Schiff, and Schumer would have introduced this resolution regardless of the target, the objective, or the justification. The resolution was always about Trump, not Iran.
Congress spoke twice in two days. Both times, the answer was the same.