House Republican leaders abruptly cancelled a scheduled vote on Thursday on a resolution that would have directed President Donald Trump to withdraw U.S. forces from Iran or seek congressional authorisation to continue the conflict, after it became clear they did not have the votes to defeat it.
The retreat exposed deepening fractures within the Republican Party over the Iran war, coming at a moment when several members have begun pushing back against the president on a conflict that a majority of Americans say is not worth the cost. It was also the latest blow to Speaker Mike Johnson, who has repeatedly worked to block legislative challenges to Trump's war-making authority while managing a razor-thin House majority and the looming pressure of midterm elections.
The decision to pull the measure came after Republicans lost control of the House floor during an earlier, unrelated vote, with several members defecting and others absent. As proceedings descended into disorder, party leaders chose to abandon the Iran war resolution rather than risk a second, far more consequential public defeat in the same day.
The move followed a similar vote in the Senate last week, where a handful of Republican senators broke with the president and advanced a comparable measure, signalling a growing willingness within the party to pressure Trump to end the conflict. In the House, a near-identical resolution failed the previous week by the slimmest possible margin, a tie vote, leaving leadership with no room for further defections.
Representative Brian Fitzpatrick, a Pennsylvania Republican who voted in favour of the previous House resolution and said he had planned to do so again, was blunt about why leaders pulled the vote. "They probably did it because they didn't have the votes," he said. "I don't think they're going to have the votes when we get back." He added: "The next time they bring it, it's passing."
It was the fourth time since Trump initiated the conflict in late February that Democrats had sought to challenge his authority to wage war without congressional approval. With both chambers entering a weeklong recess for Memorial Day, any further vote will have to wait until Congress returns in June. The delay left Republicans lamenting the dysfunction that has taken hold on Capitol Hill. "All I want is just one normal day," said Representative Virginia Foxx of North Carolina, who chairs the Rules Committee and is responsible for managing floor proceedings.
Source: The New York Times
