House again passes a resolution seeking to halt military action in Iran
as the conflict escalates
[July 24, 2026]
By MARY CLARE JALONICK
WASHINGTON (AP) — The House on Thursday narrowly passed a resolution to
halt U.S. military action in Iran, sending a warning to President Donald
Trump for the second time as the war has escalated and the future of the
conflict is increasingly uncertain.
The 214-208 vote requiring congressional approval for the war came just
before the Senate narrowly rejected a similar resolution, 47-49. Though
the votes forced by Democrats are largely symbolic, they are meant as a
signal to the Republican president that his support on Capitol Hill is
chipping away as the war drags on and lawmakers in both parties have
questioned his administration’s endgame.
The war has had “no clear mission, no strategy, no end goal,” said
Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat who led the resolution on
the House floor.
The House resolution passed after a handful of Republicans voted with
Democrats to end the war. But the vast majority of Republicans in both
chambers voted to back the war and cede congressional war powers to
Trump.
Joint U.S. and Israeli airstrikes launched the war in late February. A
tenuous ceasefire deal was reached in April, but Trump declared the
ceasefire was “over” earlier this month.
Trump has insisted that continued U.S. attacks against Iran do not mean
a return to war or long-term action. After the first House vote to halt
the war in early June, he posted on social media that it was
“unpatriotic” and “meaningless.”
A statement of administration policy issued by the White House on
Thursday noted that the resolutions don't have the force of law and
encouraged lawmakers to vote against them.
“The President has the Constitutional authority to defend the United
States and our citizens from the danger posed by the Iranian regime,”
the policy statement said. “This requires the ability to act decisively
to ensure it never obtains a nuclear weapon.”
Continued American airstrikes are occurring even as diplomatic efforts
show little public sign of progress and officials on both sides have dug
in on the dispute over the Strait of Hormuz, a crucial waterway for
global energy that remains largely closed. The unpopular war threatens
further worldwide economic disruption and is sending fuel prices up
ahead of midterm U.S. elections this fall.
“We are in this new escalatory phase where Americans have been killed,
and Americans are experiencing the rising costs — I think it’s important
that people be held accountable,” said Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a
Democrat who led the Senate effort on Thursday. “And this is a very
unpopular war.”
Most Republicans vote to cede congressional powers
As the House debated the resolution Wednesday evening, Foreign Affairs
Committee Chairman Brian Mast, R-Fla., read out names of 18 service
members killed since the war began.
“To belittle this mission is to belittle and demean the very service
these members gave their life for,” Mast said. “Their sacrifice was not
meaningless. This operation is bringing reckoning for the hundreds of
times Iran has attacked and killed people of the United States of
America.”
The top Democrat on the panel, New York Rep. Gregory Meeks, said that
presidents are supposed to make the case to Congress.
The service members who died made the ultimate sacrifice for “an illegal
unauthorized war that the American people don’t want,” Meeks said.
Democrats said they would continue to force Republicans to vote on the
issue.
“If Donald Trump won’t listen to the people and end this war then
Congress must,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.
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From left, Rep. Jason Crow, D-Colo., Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash.,
and Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas, talk to reporters just after the House
narrowly passed a resolution to halt U.S. military action in Iran,
at the Capitol in Washington, Thursday, July 23, 2026. (AP Photo/J.
Scott Applewhite)
Trump is watching Iran votes closely
Republicans on both sides of the Capitol know that voting against
the war can have a political cost, even as many of them have
privately questioned the Trump administration’s handling of the
conflict.
In his post after the June House vote, Trump called the four
Republicans who voted with Democrats “GRANDSTANDERS!” and said they
should be “ashamed of themselves.”
“They would rather have our Country fail than give me another, of
many, victories,” he said.
When the Senate passed a war powers resolution on Iran for the first
time in June, Trump called the four Republicans who voted for it
“losers" and then reprimanded them at a Senate GOP luncheon that he
attended the next day.
Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy, one of the Republicans who had voted
with Democrats, said afterward that he had clashed with Trump over
the issue. He said he told Trump directly that he needed to give
more details to the public about the conflict.
“This was supposed to last four weeks. It’s lasted four months,”
said Cassidy, who had just lost reelection in a primary after Trump
endorsed one of his opponents. “Our original objectives have not
been achieved.”
Trump argued back, Cassidy later told reporters, and he told the
president that he wouldn’t change his vote until he got a briefing.
The White House later relented, giving Cassidy a one-on-one meeting,
and the Louisiana Republican changed his vote in a late-night
do-over vote before the Senate left for a two-week recess.
Cassidy voted against the resolution again on Thursday.
Polling finds Americans disapprove of the war
Most Americans disapprove of the way Trump is handling the situation
with Iran, according to recent polling. A Washington Post/Ipsos poll
conducted in July found that few Americans think the war in Iran has
been worth fighting, and most aren’t confident that the U.S.
military action in Iran and negotiations to end the war will prevent
Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
Only about two-thirds of Republicans approve of Trump’s handling of
the situation in Iran, according to the poll. Most Republicans,
about 6 in 10, think the war has been worth fighting and are
confident that the military action and ensuing negotiations will
prevent Iran from development nuclear weapons, but a sizable share —
about one-third — are unconvinced.
Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said that if Congress can't force Trump to
seek congressional authorization then lawmakers should block war
funding. The House on Wednesday adopted a Republican-only $95
billion budget proposal, including money for the Iran war, but its
future is uncertain in the Senate.
“He wants to break the law, fine, let him break the law, but we
control the appropriations process, and that’s what we need to use,”
Kaine said.
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Associated Press writers Steven Sloan and Amelia Thomson DeVeaux
contributed to this report.
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