In the wake of an aborted bombing raid against Iran called off by President Donald Trump just minutes before it was set to launch overnight, anti-war progressives and progressive Democrats on Friday are demanding an end to the era in which the nation’s commander-in-chief is allowed to claim the authority to start a war or launch an unnecessary attack on a foreign country—a legacy created by nearly two decades of unchecked power and endless war.
“International peace cannot be left up to chance. Congress needs to do everything it can to regain its constitutional power to declare war, and end the era where the President of the United States can plunge our nation into catastrophic conflicts.”
—Justice DemocratsAccording to the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the most powerful Democrat in Congress, the White House did not even inform her of the plan to launch the attack despite a meeting with the president and top staffers just hours earlier.
In a clip of an interview with NBC‘s “Meet the Press” released on Friday, Trump explained that while the warplanes were “about ready to go” but not yet in the air, it was nearly the point of no return when he finally decided to issue the stand down order. Watch:
In response to Trump’s behavior, progressive Democrats running for president were among those denouncing the fact that he had come within just minutes of ordering a strike that would have sparked untold death and damage.
“A war with Iran would be a disaster and lead to endless conflict in the region,” said Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, on Friday morning. “Congress must assert its constitutional authority and stop Trump from going to war.”
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), also running for president, tweeted: “Donald Trump promised to bring our troops home. Instead he has pulled out of a deal that was working and instigated another unnecessary conflict. There is no justification for further escalating this crisis—we need to step back from the brink of war.”
Groups outspoken in their opposition to war with Iran, including CodePink and Win Without War, issued alarm over just how close Trump admits he was to giving the final order to pull the trigger:
In a tweet issued after news broke of Trump’s aborted attack, progressive journalist John Nichols—who has written critically and extensively on the rise of unchecked executive power during the tenures of George H. Bush and Barack Obama, and Trump—emphasized how the current president, like his predecessors, has no constitutional authority to wage war or launch offensive attacks without the explicit consent of Congress:
“Where is the Congress?” Nichols asked. “Decisions about war and peace should not be left to the whims of a president who is ill-prepared, ill-informed, and ill-advised.”
In an email to its members on Friday, the progressive advocacy group Justice Democrats—which has organized to elect anti-war candidates over more hawkish members of the party—said that even though Trump called off the strike at the last minute, the overnight episode “highlights a disturbing reality that we must face—this could happen at any time.”
And the threat of war continues, the group warned. “Without the light and power of public pressure,” the email continued, “Trump’s administration could wield the most powerful military in the world to suit their own political purposes. That’s not just scary. It’s disturbing on a fundamental level. The notion that unconfirmed executive officials and members of an administration that the majority of Americans did not vote for could condemn us to yet another multi-decade bloody conflict displays a structural problem in our foreign policy, and a structural problem in Trump’s ability to wage unchecked war.”
Prior to Thursday night’s developments, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), the only member of Congress to vote against the original Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) following the attacks of September 11, 2001, wrote: “As Trump and [Secretary of State Mike] Pompeo continue to provoke war with Iran, it’s more important than ever that Congress take back its authority on war and peace. We cannot continue to give the Executive Branch a blank check for endless war.”
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