Senate rejects Booker’s new Iran war powers push

Senator Cory Booker and a handful of other senators have taken the lead on Democrats’ newest push to rein in the ongoing war in Iran, though the Senate rejected their first concrete effort to do so in a vote last night.

The New Jersey senator and five of his colleagues, collectively dubbed the “Senate Six,” have spent the last few weeks making the case to the media and to their fellow senators that President Donald Trump’s strikes in Iran are unwise and unconstitutional. Congress, Booker argues, needs to step in.

“What is worse: the strategic blunder after blunder that [Trump] is making, or Republicans in the United States Senate who watch him and don’t even call his administration in for hearings?” Booker told Rachel Maddow earlier this week. “No checks, no balances, no accountability.”

Yesterday evening, the Senate Six’s first concrete effort to stop the war came up for a vote via a war powers resolution sponsored by Booker, directing Trump to cease military activities in Iran unless given authorization by Congress. In a procedural vote, the resolution failed 47-53, with Booker, Senator Andy Kim, and all but one fellow Democrat voting in favor (and all but one Republican voting against).

That’s exactly the same outcome as a prior war powers vote that came just a few days after the first strikes in Iran. The House also voted on that earlier resolution and rejected it in a similarly close vote; every New Jersey Democrat supported that resolution, though a few did so with some trepidation.

The votes aren’t likely to end anytime soon, with the Senate Six continuing their push and a different effort co-led by Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-Tenafly) set to come up in the House next week. Booker spent part of yesterday meeting with veterans and military families, and the senator said it further strengthened his resolve to keep forcing the issue.

“The veterans and military families I heard from today underscored the horrible stakes of war and why I am using every lever of power I can in the Senate to hold this administration accountable and stop its war of choice,” Booker said in a statement after last night’s vote failed.