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Tuesday, March 3, 2026

The Senate can restrain Trump on Iran — but it won’t

Welcome to the the most important decision of President Donald Trump’s second term - and likely his entire time in the White House.

Over the weekend, the president announced that the United States and Israel had launched coordinated strikes against Iran and killed the country’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

As of Monday, six U.S. service members have been killed. “Sadly, there will likely be more... before it ends, that’s the way it is,” Trump said Sunday.

Sending Americans into war is the most consequential decisions any president can take. It’s why the Constitution vests the power to declare war with Congress, which is more directly accountable to voters than the executive.

But don’t expect the Republican-controlled Congress to take any action to restrain Trump.

In the hours after the strikes, Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia lambasted the military action and questioned if Trump is too “mentally incapacitated” to understand the effects of his decision. Kaine has led efforts to force a War Powers Act resolution through Congress, which allows the legislative branch to rein in a president’s military power.

Initially passed in 1973, the War Powers Act requires the executive branch inform Congress within 48 hours of troops being deployed.

In addition, it requires that troops be withdrawn within 60 days, with a possible 30-day extension, if Congress has not declared war or authorized the use of military force.

But consistently, Congress has rebuffed these efforts. Earlier this year, after Trump’s attack on Venezuela, five Republicans voted with Democrats for a War Powers Act resolution to go through. Then Trump raged against the Republicans who did so and Senators Josh Hawley of Missouri and Todd Young of Indiana flipped their votes, defeating the resolution.

Read more here:

By Eric Garcia

Reading list

Ted Thornhill: US-Iran strikes: What Americans need to know about flight disruption in the Middle East
Katie Hawkinson and J.R. Duren: How the Iran attacks could dent Americans’ pockets: Gas prices, shipping and food

Daily briefing

Trump says an Iran with nuclear weapons would be ‘intolerable threat’ to US in first public comments

President Trump claimed Monday that Tehran would have been able to strike the U.S. with ballistic missiles, Andrew Feinberg reports.

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QUOTE OF THE DAY

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Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton amid questioning from Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) about Jeffrey Epstein.

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