Silicon Valley Rep. Ro Khanna is rallying Democrats and Republicans in Congress this week to demand the U.S. immediately withdraw its troops from the war with Iran — a position with which prominent California Democrats appear to agree.
Khanna (D-Santa Clara) wrote in an op-ed on the Fox News site Tuesday that he and Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) would be forcing a House vote Thursday on a resolution calling for the removal of U.S. armed forces from “unauthorized hostilities in the Islamic Republic of Iran,” barring a declaration of war or congressional authorization for use of military force.
Khanna, in his op-ed, called the vote possibly “one of the most consequential in our nation’s history,” adding that Congress can “play a critical check on this unthinking march into deeper and more reckless war.”
The coordinated U.S.-Israel attack that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other high-ranking Iranian leaders late Friday night was done without congressional authorization. Trump maintains he has authority as commander-in-chief.
Sen. Adam Schiff, a Jewish Democrat who supports Israel, co-sponsored a similar war powers resolution in the Senate, expected for a vote on Wednesday. He spoke on the Senate floor Monday, denouncing Trump’s “illegal” war with Iran.
“The Constitution gives Congress alone the power to declare war,” Schiff said, noting that the Founding Fathers did so out of concern for a future war-mongering president.
“Given that now this is at least the third broad use of military force by this president, I believe the founders’ worst fears have come to pass,” Schiff said. Trump “is too fond of going to war, to gain the oil assets of one country, and to engage in the regime change of another.”
On Tuesday, POLITICO reported that that Reps. Jim Costa and Jimmy Panetta of Northern California were among six House Democrats co-sponsoring an alternate war powers resolution. It calls for an end to military operations in Iran within 30 days, unless there is congressional authorization for use of military force or a declaration of war.
California is home to the largest Iranian diaspora in the United States. Los Angeles is home to the largest Persian Jewish community outside Iran. Many of them have expressed hope about the prospect of their country liberated from its oppressive theocratic government.
A broad swath of Bay Area Democrats — from Reps. Nancy Pelosi, Sam Liccardo, Lateefah Simon and Zoe Lofgren to state Sen. Scott Wiener and gubernatorial candidates Tom Steyer and Rep. Eric Swalwell — have publicly denounced Trump’s military actions in Iran. Liccardo, Simon, Lofgren and Wiener all have emphatically voiced support for a war powers resolution.
In a post on social media Saturday, Pelosi called the war in Iran “unnecessary” and a threat to the safety of American servicemembers. Six had been killed in action as of Monday afternoon.
In a live, televised interview Tuesday morning, Swalwell (D-East Bay) told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer that he’s skeptical of whether the president has a plan in place.
“Donald Trump has more plans for the ballroom in the East Wing than he does for a war in the Middle East, and our job in Congress is to make sure that we lose the least amount of troops possible, the least amount of Iranians possible, [and] of course keep our allies in the region safe,” said Swalwell. “It’s very worrisome there appears to be no plan from the planner in chief.”
Amid such sweeping criticism of the U.S.-Israel war in Iran, President Trump’s top national security advisers spent most of the day Tuesday holding briefings in front of the full Senate, and later for all members of the House.
Wiener, an outspoken critic of both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, explained what’s at stake in a video posted to Instagram Saturday.
“It risks the U.S. imposing a puppet regime on Iran similar to Venezuela, which is the exact opposite of Iranian self-determination,” said Wiener (D-San Francisco). Removing Khamenei, whose regime he described as “straight-up evil,” will not lead to automatic freedom or stability for Iranians.
“The future of Iran must be decided by the people of Iran, and only the people of Iran,” Wiener stated.