Lawmakers from the Democratic Party were united in calling Iran a threat but divided on what to do about it.
Congressional leaders of the Democratic Party have mostly been quick to decry President Donald Trump and Israel’s joint operation in Iran over the weekend, which killed Iranian leader Ali Khamenei and other Iranian officials, while many other party members have been supportive.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said that in conversations with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, he has been clear the Trump administration must be straightforward with Congress and the American people, adding that Iran “must never be allowed to attain a nuclear weapon but the American people do not want another endless and costly war in the Middle East when there are so many problems at home.”
“The administration has not provided Congress and the American people with critical details about the scope and immediacy of the threat,” Schumer said in a Feb. 28 statement after the strikes.
“Confronting Iran’s malign regional activities, nuclear ambitions, and harsh oppression of the Iranian people demands American strength, resolve, regional coordination, and strategic clarity. Unfortunately, President Trump’s fitful cycles of lashing out and risking wider conflict are not a viable strategy.”
On March 2, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) held a similar stance, stating that Iran was a “bad actor” that must be “aggressively confronted for its human rights violations, nuclear ambitions, support of terrorism,” and threats to allies in the region such as Israel and Jordan.
Jeffries added in his opinion that the Trump administration had “failed to provide any justification for these preemptive strikes.”
“We’ll continue to look for information that they owe the American people to suggest that there was intelligence indicating that Iran was prepared to strike the United States,” he told CNN News Central. “Nothing has been presented to justify what’s taking place up until this point, and the administration has an obligation to be able to prove that.”
Jeffries said that Americans want Congress and the president to focus on making their life better and more affordable, “not getting involved in another endless war in the Middle East that is going to end in failure.”
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth disputed the “endless war” remark made by Jeffries and others during a news conference at the Pentagon, saying the Iranian campaign is not another endless war like Iraq.
“This is not Iraq,” Hegseth said on Monday, speaking directly to American military forces around the world. “This is not endless. I was there for both. Our generation knows better and so does this president. He called the last 20 years of nation-building wars dumb, and he’s right. This is the opposite. This operation is a clear, devastating, decisive mission.”
Hegseth said there were three main points to the operation: destroy the missile threat, destroy the navy, and no nuclear weapons.
“This is the generational turning point America has waited for since 1979,” Hegseth added. “And since the rudderless wars of hubris my generation, our generation endured. Don’t listen to the noise—just stay focused. Our commander-in-chief is steady at the wheel.”
By Chase Smith
