House Republicans narrowly voted down a resolution Thursday to end the war with Iran, marking the third time a war powers resolution has failed in the lower chamber since the conflict began.

The vote was 212-212, with three Republicans crossing the aisle to support the measure: Reps. Thomas Massie (Ky.), Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.) and Tom Barrett (Mich.). One Democrat, Rep. Jared Golden (Maine), bucked Democratic leaders to oppose it.

In the House, a tie vote means a measure fails.

The vote is a victory for President Trump and GOP leaders in the Capitol, who have argued that the president has the unilateral authority to confront Tehran militarily. They’ve also warned that ending the war would empower Iran’s Islamic regime at the expense of the national security of the United States and Western allies.

Across the aisle, it marks yet another defeat for Democrats — and a small handful of Republicans — who have fought to assert Congress’s constitutional authority to dictate the use of military force abroad.

Still, Democrats are vowing to put a steady string of war powers resolutions on the floor in the coming weeks. That strategy, being led by the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC), is designed to force public debate on a conflict that’s unpopular with most voters — and put Republicans on the record defending it.

And supporters will get a boost in the next round from Golden, a former Marine who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, who said he opposed Thursday’s resolution only because it includes a withdrawal deadline, March 30, that’s long past. When the next “clean” resolution hits the floor, Golden said he’ll support it.

“I supported this resolution when it was introduced, but unfortunately its proposed 30-day deadline lacks any real meaning now that we are more than 70 days into this conflict,” Golden said Wednesday in a statement. “It no longer passes the straight-face test. I look forward to voting for a clean, relevant resolution as soon as possible.”

Thursday’s resolution was sponsored by Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), one of Congress’s most vocal supporters of Israel, who had initially opposed the idea of forcing Trump to win congressional approval before striking Iran, citing the security threat Tehran posed to the U.S. and its interests in the Middle East. That changed by the time that resolution hit the floor on March 5, just days after the conflict began, with Gottheimer bashing the administration for failing to offer either a clear reason for starting the war or an explicit plan for ending it.

His resolution cites the 1973 War Powers Act, which requires a president seeking to continue the use of military force to win approval from Congress within 60 days of launching the initial attacks. Gottheimer’s bill expedited that timeline, setting a deadline of 30 days.

A similar bill was blocked in the Senate on Wednesday, marking the seventh time Trump’s Senate allies have killed a Democratic war powers resolution. The Senate resolution did pick up some additional GOP support, however, with Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) joining Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) and Rand Paul (Ky.) in voting in favor.

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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US forces attacked missile sites in southern Iran and boats trying to lay mines on Monday, US Central Command said, imperiling a fragile ceasefire and casting new doubt on a deal to end the Middle East war.

The strikes came as top Iranian negotiators arrived in Doha for the latest round of talks to end the months-long conflict, and as the Israeli military stepped up hostilities with Iran-backed Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

Oil prices fluctuated in the wake of the US strikes, which may threaten any agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, where an Iranian blockade has choked global fuel supplies.

"US forces conducted self-defense strikes in southern Iran today to protect our troops from threats posed by Iranian forces," Tim Hawkins, a US Central Command spokesman, said in a statement.

It gave no details of the attacks and said only that the targets included missile launch sites and boats trying to "emplace mines."

Iran's state-run broadcaster IRIB reported several loud explosions were heard in the vicinity of Bandar Abbas at around midnight local time (2030 GMT Monday).

It added the situation in the southern port city was normal and local authorities were investigating the cause of the blasts.

The strikes threatened a ceasefire that began April 8 as the United States and Iran struggle to reach an accord to end a war that has rattled the global economy with a severe disruption of energy flows.

Oil prices remained below $100 on Tuesday morning, with West Texas Intermediate dropping more than five percent while international benchmark Brent crude was up.

Hopes of an accord took another blow when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to "crush" Hezbollah in Lebanon. Iran has demanded that any peace accord apply to the fighting in Lebanon as well.

Trump also said in a social media post he expected Iran to hand over its enriched uranium to the United States to be destroyed, or have it destroyed in Iran with an international witness.

"The Enriched Uranium (Nuclear Dust!) will either be immediately turned over to the United States to be brought home and destroyed or, preferably, in conjunction and coordination with the Islamic Republic of Iran, destroyed in place or, at another acceptable location, with the Atomic Energy Commission, or its equivalent, being witness to this process and event," Trump wrote.

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It was not clear whether he meant this would be part of a potential accord with Iran, and the commission he cited was abolished in 1974.

Earlier Monday, Trump said it should be mandatory for Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey, Bahrain and Jordan to sign up to the Abraham Accords, a set of agreements brokered in 2020 with nations historically hostile to Israel, as part of a peace deal with Iran.

Trump said he had spoken to the leaders of those countries Saturday about efforts to end the war. Bahrain and the UAE have already signed the accords, along with Morocco and Sudan.

The US-Iranian ceasefire has held while diplomats push for a negotiated settlement, although Iran has maintained controls on Gulf shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and the US Navy has sought to blockade Iran's ports.

While the Abraham Accords were welcomed by some, they remain deeply unpopular in many parts of the Middle East -- in part because they fail to address the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Gulf heavyweights like Saudi Arabia and Qatar have said they will never normalize ties with Israel unless an independent Palestinian state is created.

- 'Going crazy' -

Anna Jacobs of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington said it was unlikely that Gulf nations would bow to Trump's latest demand.

"The national security of the Gulf states has been threatened more than ever before because of President Trump's reckless decisions, and he expects Arab states to thank him and to normalize relations with Israel, which they will not do at this stage," she said.

Trump's maximalist demand came after Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested a deal could be reached within the day.

"We thought we might have some news last night, maybe today," Rubio told reporters during a visit to New Delhi.

But Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei poured cold water on hopes for a quick final settlement.

"It is correct to say that we have reached a conclusion on a large portion of the issues under discussion," he told a weekly news briefing.

"But to say that this means the signing of an agreement is imminent -- no one can make such a claim."

- 'Critical moment' -

Netanyahu said Monday that he had ordered the military to intensify its offensive in Lebanon, accusing Hezbollah of targeting Israeli forces with drone attacks.

"I have ordered an even greater acceleration of our operations," Netanyahu said in a video statement posted on his Telegram channel.

The Israeli leader said Sunday that he and Trump had agreed that "any final agreement with Iran must eliminate the nuclear threat entirely" before peace was reached.

Iranian officials have stressed that, despite the longstanding US demand for an end to its uranium enrichment, talks on the issue of the Islamic republic's nuclear program have been deferred until after an initial agreement.

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President Donald Trump’s poll numbers are now so dire that his disapproval rating is higher than at any point in his two terms, including following the Jan. 6 Capitol riots in 2021.

After a string of dismal polls over the past few weeks, Trump’s average disapproval rating is now at 58.3 percent—higher than the previous average of 57.9 percent, which he achieved in the aftermath of the Capitol insurrection.

RealClearPolitics averages all the major polls to determine the president’s rating, and its latest aggregate revealed the extent of the damage Trump’s image has suffered.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trump’s appeal has been waning among voters since his war with Iran began on Feb. 28. The blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has led to record-high gas prices and driven debate around the cost of living.

Trump has also compounded the view that he doesn’t fully grasp the financial stress of Americans by repeatedly admitting that he doesn’t think about Americans’ financial struggles in his attempts to achieve a peace deal with Iran. “Not even a little bit,” he said.

One poll released Tuesday found that seven in 10 Americans say they’re either “angry” or “frustrated” with Trump’s handling of the economy.

The billionaire president has been slow to address these concerns, describing the cost of gas as “peanuts,” signaling that his own wealth is perhaps a barrier to understanding the plight of the average American family.

“I appreciate everyone putting up with it for a little while; it won’t be much longer,” the 79-year-old said on May 19, while standing in front of the demolished East Wing and showing off his plans for his huge new ballroom that he tried to get $1 billion in taxpayer funding for.

Trump also admitted that he knew the war in Iran was unpopular, but then immediately contradicted himself.

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“Everyone tells me [the war] is unpopular, but I think it’s very popular,” he said.

“Whether it’s popular or not popular, I have to do it, because I’m not going to let the world be blown up on my watch. Not gonna happen.”

President Donald Trump has issued an insane “shooting” threat as his Iran negotiations look to have stalled.

The 79-year-old had talked up the prospect of an impending deal over the weekend, only for his tone to cool. “I have informed my representatives not to rush into a deal,” he said on Sunday.

But he was back to using threats to try to force the issue on Monday, writing in an almost 600-word Truth Social rant that the “shooting” will return if Iran doesn’t play ball on a deal. He mixed this maniacal threat with an assurance that negotiations are going swimmingly.

“Negotiations with the Islamic Republic of Iran are proceeding nicely! It will only be a Great Deal for all or, no Deal at all — Back to the Battlefront and shooting, but bigger and stronger than ever before — And nobody wants that!” he declared.

The two sides have stalled on certain components of the deal, with Trump unmoved in his insistence that Iran should at least pause its nuclear enrichment program for 20 years. The nations have both tabled conditions for an eventual amnesty, but the speed of the deal has been hampered by the fact that Iran’s Supreme Leader is in hiding with a direct line to him purposely complicated via an ad hoc network of intermediaries.

And despite these already-tricky components, Trump also wants several Middle Eastern nations to sign the Abraham Accords, a set of agreements that normalize relations between Jewish and Arab states.

With his legacy in mind, Trump, perhaps optimistically, forecast “true Power, Strength, and Peace to the Middle East for the first time in 5,000 years.”

He urged Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt, and Jordan to sign, with a caveat that reads like an or else.

“If they don’t, they should not be part of this Deal in that it shows bad intention,” he said, adding that he’d like Iran to sign eventually, too.

He added: “I am mandatorily requesting that all Countries immediately sign the Abraham Accords, and that, if Iran signs its Agreement with me, as President of the United States of America, it would be an Honor to have them also be part of this unparalleled World Coalition. The Middle East would be United, Powerful, and Economically Strong, like perhaps no other area, anywhere in the World!”

And delivering his doctrine via his social media site, he concluded, “By copy of this TRUTH, I am asking my Representatives to begin, and successfully complete, the process of signing these Countries into the already Historic Abraham Accords.”

May 25 (Reuters) - The U.S. Justice Department has again asked a federal judge to lift an injunction holding up progress ‌on President Donald Trump's ballroom project, saying Saturday's shooting outside ‌the White House showed an urgent need for improved security.

The Justice Department, in a ​five-page court filing on Sunday, said the incident underscores the critical need for "top level, state of the art security at the White House, including the ballroom," adding that it was vital for national security. It also ‌asks for the lawsuit challenging ⁠the project to be dismissed.

The court filing stated: "This is a terrible, tremendously harmful case to the United States ⁠of America, and all it stands for!"

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon, an appointee of former President George W. Bush sitting in Washington, ruled in ​April that ​Trump lacked legal authority to build ​the ballroom without congressional approval. ‌Leon issued an injunction that halted "above-ground construction of the planned ballroom," but his order was quickly put on hold by an appeals court. Construction has continued.

The DOJ had previously asked Leon to dissolve his injunction and throw out the lawsuit over the ballroom after a foiled attack ‌at the White House Correspondents' Association dinner in ​April. Leon has not acted on that request.

The ​lawsuit was filed by ​the National Trust for Historic Preservation, a congressionally chartered ‌nonprofit organization. It said it would ​not drop its ​lawsuit after the attack in April, despite the Justice Department's request.

The gunman who fired at a White House checkpoint on Saturday ​was shot by officers ‌and died after being taken to the hospital on Saturday ​evening, the Secret Service said.

(Reporting by Arathy Somasekhar in Houston, ​editing by Deepa Babington, Rod Nickel)

JERUSALEM (AP) — The deal being discussed between the U.S. and Iran fails to achieve any of Israel’s goals for the war, Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid said on Monday, as he accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of failing to influence a better agreement.

Lapid, who is part of an alliance attempting to unseat Netanyahu in elections this year, said details of the emerging deal are “disturbing.”

“The deal is bad for Israel, bad for the region, bad for the citizens of Iran,” Lapid told reporters in Jerusalem.

Israel and the U.S. launched the war on Feb. 28 vowing to destroy Iran’s ballistic missile program, end its support for proxy militant groups across the region and end Iran’s ability to pursue a nuclear bomb. Both Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump also said they hoped to create conditions to topple Iran’s government.

According to regional officials, under the current deal being discussed Iran would give up its stockpile of highly enriched uranium and reopen the strategic Strait of Hormuz in exchange for ending a U.S. blockade of Iranian ports and the lifting of sanctions against Iran. Key details on Iran’s nuclear program would then be negotiated during a 60-day period. It is unclear if the deal will address Iran’s missiles or support for regional militant groups.

Lapid expressed gratitude to Trump for launching the war with Israel, but criticized Netanyahu for allowing Washington to negotiate a potential deal with little coordination with Israel.

“The Israeli government is at an all-time low in its ability to influence decisions in Washington,” he said, noting that Trump said last week: “Netanyahu will do whatever I want him to do.”

Netanyahu has repeatedly stressed to Trump that Israel maintains “freedom of action” against threats in any arena, according to an official familiar with Israel prime minister's conversations with Trump, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

“Israel is a sovereign state, we are not a vassal state and we are not a protectorate,” Lapid said.

Lapid, head of the centrist “Yesh Atid” party, briefly served as prime minister in 2022 under a rotation agreement with Naftali Bennett, leader of a small conservative party. Their coalition government ended 12 years of Netanyahu’s rule.

They have once again merged their parties into a single faction headed by Bennett as they attempt to unseat Netanyahu in elections that will be held by the end of October.

Lapid has served as Israel’s opposition leader since Netanyahu returned to power in late 2022, while Bennett took a break from politics. Their alliance is aimed at uniting a fragmented opposition with a shared hostility toward Netanyahu.

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Lapid, one of a shrinking number of Israeli politicians who supports the idea of Palestinian independence, said the issue would not be on the next government’s agenda. He said the conditions are not right following the trauma of the Hamas attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, and wars that have followed.

“There will be no two-state solution in the coming years, because Israelis now understand this will become just another failing terrorist state on our borders,” said Lapid, adding that the Palestinian Authority does not have the ability to effectively prevent attacks against Israel.

But Lapid said he would oppose unilateral steps that would make a future Palestinian state impossible and had received assurances from Bennett, a former West Bank settlement leader, that Israel will not move toward annexing the occupied territory.

Lapid also ruled out cooperation with Arab parties to build a coalition to unseat Netanyahu.

Opinion polls indicate that Bennett and Lapid might not be able to form a governing majority coalition without the support of some Arab lawmakers, as they did in their previous government. They broke a longstanding taboo in 2021 when they invited Mansour Abbas, leader of a small Arab faction, into Israel’s governing coalition for the first and only time in Israel’s history.

Lapid said his previous cooperation with Abbas was “the right government for the moment,” but that Israel is in a very different place after nearly three years of wars and that he and Bennett will not build a coalition with Abbas’ party in the next elections.