Will Democrats Do Anything To Stop Trump's War With Iran?

High-ranking Democrats are working on their own way to stop a war with Iran — instead of signing onto a war powers resolution.

By Matt Sledge, The Intercept

Americans are opposed to a war with Iran.

With voters on their side, some rank-and-file Democrats in Congress teamed up with a Republican to try to block President Donald Trump from launching just such a war. With limited support from Democratic Party leadership, however, those efforts faltered.

Now that Trump has launched a military assault against Iran, Democratic leaders are still deciding how to react.

Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, for his part, has yet to announce whether he backs a bipartisan resolution to halt military action.

Instead of backing the existing resolution from Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., high-ranking Democrats in the House are reportedly working on an alternative measure. Advocates for the bipartisan bill fear the alternative could dilute support for the initial measure.

In the Senate, meanwhile, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer belatedly threw his support behind a companion War Powers Resolution. With broad Republican support for Trump, that bill faces long odds of success.

Advocates said they are pushing hard for Democrats to line up behind the bipartisan measure, but they wish that Democratic leaders such as Schumer had acted sooner.

“Perhaps if Trump had seen aggressive pushback and a united front from the Democratic Party,” said Yasmine Taeb, the legislative and political director for the Muslim advocacy group MPower Change, “then he wouldn’t have felt so emboldened to move forward with the unauthorized strikes on Iran.”