Democrats are expected to win a majority of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives on November 3 and to take power in January with an ambitious agenda. But their ability to stop a lame-duck president notoriously allergic to legislative oversight from continuing an unpopular foreign war is limited.
As commander in chief, Trump retains enormous power to wage war or peace. While Congress can attempt to impede his actions through legislation and control over the federal budget, Trump has shown a willingness, especially in his second term, to defy U.S. laws and Congressional allocations. Resolutions against continuing the Iran war have already passed but not by veto proof majorities. And even if the Democrats also win the Senate on November 3, their majority is likely to be razor thin.
Ryan Costello, policy director for the National Iranian American Council, a U.S. advocacy group that strongly opposes the Iran war, told me that it would be difficult for Trump to continue the war if Congress explicitly bans it and conducts oversight including hauling Pentagon officials onto Capitol Hill to testify about the war’s multiple failures and possibly impeaching Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. But Costello also conceded he is “worried about the lame duck” period before a new Congress is seated.
Trump’s repeated threats to strike Iran hard after the midterms make a new round of fighting likely. It is possible that Trump will then insist that the U.S. “won” even if the regime is still standing and pivot to some other foreign policy adventure such as a Cuba intervention favored by his secretary of state, Marco Rubio. But even if the U.S. ends its blockade of Iranian ports, Iran would still retain the ability to control traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, and the Houthis could continue to threaten shipping through the Red Sea. A definitive peace deal that provides Iran with the sanctions relief and unfrozen assets promised in an ill-fated June memorandum of understanding would remain elusive. There would also be no guarantee of regional peace, including an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon, although oil prices might ease.
A bigger factor than the U.S. midterms may be the results of the Israeli elections. As I write on the eve of that vote, it is unclear if Israelis will give a majority to parties looking to extricate Israel from its multiple wars. If the rightwing government of Benjamin Netanyahu goes, pressure will ease on Trump to continue the conflict that Bibi sought for his entire political life. But Trump will still want to find some way to insist that the war was worth the costs on the U.S. and global economies as well as Trump’s own political party. The Islamic Republic is unlikely to make any such claims easy and will instead be tempted to gloat and overplay its hand. The region will remain on edge as long as Trump is president and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps rules Iran.
Barbara Slavin is a distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center and the author of “Bitter Friends, Bosom Enemies: Iran, the U.S. and the Twisted Path to Confrontation.”
