Search for posts, channels, users, hashtags & more

US House Backs Iran War Powers Measure As Seven Republicans Defy Trump

The House approved a concurrent war powers resolution Tuesday directing President Donald Trump to halt hostilities in Iran, passing the measure 220–204 with the support of seven Republicans.

Republican Reps. Tom Barrett, Warren Davidson, Brian Fitzpatrick, Nancy Mace, Thomas Massie, Zach Nunn, and Mariannette Miller-Meeks joined a united Democratic caucus to back the measure. Introduced by Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), the resolution expresses congressional intent but does not carry the force of law.

“My position hasn’t changed,” said Barrett, one of three GOP defectors facing a tight reelection race. “Only Congress has the authority to authorize military action in Iran. I remain ready to work with anyone to eliminate hostile threats to our nation without getting us into another endless war.”

The vote lands amid rising economic strain and lukewarm public support. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the five-month-old conflict has cost more than $38 billion, while nationwide gas prices averaged $4.36 per gallon on Wednesday.

Rep. Thomas Massie (Tucker Carlson Show)

New polling shows 58% of Americans oppose the war, with 34% in favor.

Lawmakers previously passed a similar concurrent resolution in June, which Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said left Trump “mad as a murder hornet.”

Tensions escalated further Tuesday when Massie announced he will force an impeachment vote against Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, accusing him of violating the War Powers Resolution of 1973, carrying out extrajudicial killings, and intimidating lawmakers.

Read more: 13,500 Targets Hit, 18 Dead, And A $33 Billion Tab: Watchdog Lays Bare Toll Of Iran Campaign - TFP

 

Grok Summary

The House vote in the article is a concurrent resolution expressing Congress’s view; it does not itself have the force of law. That fight is the same old split: Article I gives Congress the power to declare war; Article II makes the President Commander in Chief and vests the executive power in him. What follows is the list of executive authorities that actually exist in the original text and in long-standing practice—not a claim that the President may start a full-scale war on his own.

1. Original Constitution (text + Founding-era understanding)

Text that actually exists

  • Vesting Clause (Art. II, § 1): “The executive Power shall be vested in a President…”
  • Commander in Chief Clause (Art. II, § 2): “The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States.”
  • Take Care Clause (Art. II, § 3): he “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
  • Receive Ambassadors (Art. II, § 3): the core of the President’s role as the nation’s sole organ in foreign relations.
  • Oath (Art. II, § 1): “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution.”

What the Framers meant those clauses to do

Madison moved the Convention from “make war” to “declare war” specifically to leave the President power to repel sudden attacks without waiting for Congress. That is the only clearly agreed original exception for initiating force.

Hamilton in Federalist 69: the office is “the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first General and Admiral,” not the British king’s power to declare war or raise armies. That last pair belongs to Congress.

Washington’s practice matched the text: he treated offensive expeditions as requiring congressional authorization. Jefferson, Madison, and Marshall said the same. The original allocation is therefore:

Function Who has it
Decide to start a war (formal or de facto) Congress (Declare War + letters of marque)
Raise, fund, regulate, and size the forces Congress
Command those forces once they exist President
Repel a sudden attack on the U.S., its territories, or its forces President (no prior vote required)
Conduct campaigns, tactics, and operations after Congress has authorized hostilities President
   

The Commander in Chief power is superintendence and direction, not a blank check to commence war.

2. Long-standing legal interpretation and practice (what presidents actually do)

Courts almost never decide these cases on the merits (political-question / standing). The operative law is therefore practice + Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) opinions, plus the War Powers Resolution of 1973 (which every president since Nixon has treated as not fully binding on Article II).

A. Powers almost no one disputes

  1. Repel sudden attack — The Prize Cases (1863): if war is made on the United States, the President “is not only authorized but bound to resist force by force” without waiting for Congress.
  2. Command and direct any forces Congress has raised: deployments, targeting, rules of engagement, campaign plans, battlefield tactics. Fleming v. Page (1850): “purely military… employ them in the manner he may deem most effectual.”
  3. Protect U.S. persons, property, and embassies abroad — rescue, evacuation, limited retaliation. Used from the Barbary period through the Mayaguez incident, Tehran hostage rescue attempt, Lebanon evacuations, etc. OLC has treated this as core Article II.
  4. Self-defense of U.S. forces already lawfully stationed abroad — return fire, force protection. Executive lawyers have long said this is not even an “introduction” into hostilities under the War Powers Resolution.
  5. Execute statutes and treaties — enforce an AUMF, a blockade authorized by Congress, a status-of-forces agreement, or the Take Care duty as to existing law.

 

B. The modern executive-branch test for unilateral force short of “war”

OLC (used by administrations of both parties since the 1990s) applies a two-part test:

  1. The President reasonably determines the action serves important national interests (examples actually cited: protect Americans, support an ally or partner, regional stability, deter WMD use, humanitarian catastrophe, U.N. credibility).
  2. The anticipated nature, scope, and duration will not rise to “war in the constitutional sense”—i.e., not a prolonged, substantial engagement that exposes large numbers of U.S. personnel to significant risk over a long period.

OLC has said the following did not constitute constitutional “war” and therefore did not need a prior declaration or AUMF:

  • Haiti (1994), Bosnia, Somalia (early phase)
  • Kosovo air campaign (1999)
  • Libya air campaign (2011) — thousands of sorties, no U.S. combat deaths
  • Syria chemical-weapons strikes (2017, 2018)
  • Soleimani strike (2020)
  • Various limited anti-ISIL strikes before/alongside the 2001 AUMF

That is the legal theory the executive branch uses for “small” operations worldwide.

C. Historical pattern (practice as gloss)

Hundreds of uses of force since 1789 were never accompanied by a declaration of war. Early ones were tiny (pirates, landing parties, chasing bandits across the Mexican border). The scale jumped after 1945:

  • Korea (1950) — Truman called it a “police action” under a U.N. resolution; no declaration, no AUMF.
  • Grenada (1983), Panama (1989), Kosovo (1999), Libya (2011) — no prior statutory authorization.
  • Formal declarations of war last occurred in 1941–42. Everything since has been AUMFs, appropriations, or pure Article II claims.

Congress’s remaining hard checks are the power of the purse, statutes that condition funding, and (if it can muster the votes) a joint resolution that the President must sign or that is passed over a veto. A concurrent resolution like the one in the Tampa article does not cut off funds and does not legally order withdrawal.

3. What the executive does not have, even under the broad reading

  • Authority to start a full-scale, prolonged war against another state without Congress, under the prevailing (not the most aggressive Bush-era) OLC view. Even expansive OLC opinions usually concede that “war in the constitutional sense” still belongs to Congress.
  • Power to ignore a valid funding cutoff.
  • Preclusive power to ignore every statute that regulates how force is used (that point is still contested; Barron & Lederman’s work is the leading originalist case that CINC is not preclusive of statutes).
  • Power to create the army or navy—Congress must raise and fund them first.

Bottom line in one sentence

Original Constitution: President commands the forces Congress creates and may repel sudden attacks; he does not decide to go to war.


Long-standing practice + OLC: President may also use limited force worldwide to protect Americans and “national interests” so long as the operation is not expected to become a large, long war—and he has done so, repeatedly, for more than two centuries.

The Iran concurrent resolution in the article is Congress trying to reassert the first half of that sentence. The executive’s answer, historically, has been the second half.

Sources

This latest House vote (Sept. 15–16, 2026)

June House/Senate votes (first passage + Senate flip)

July vote (after fighting resumed / U.S. deaths)

Earlier failed votes / commentary (March–May)

Related conservative coverage of the war itself (same week)