Current Affairs Of Pakistan & World: Dems’ Iran options run low

Dems’ Iran options run low

Apr 09, 2026

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THE CATCH-UP

ON THE HOUSE STEPS: Democrats have one main point of leverage to check President Donald Trump on the war in Iran. But if this morning was any indication, it’s not going so well for the party out of power — or the branch meant to balance the executive.

A set of House Democrats attempted to pass a war powers resolution via unanimous consent — but were stopped before they could. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) sharply gaveled out the pro forma session before Democrats could even say “Iran” — an ironic (or perhaps fitting) move as the administration leaves Congress largely in the dark on the war.

“The pro forma speaker ignored us, which is a tragedy,” Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), who was among the Democrats on hand for the hail mary move, told reporters.

“It’s on the wrong track,” Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-Md.), who was prepared to introduce the motion, told reporters after. “Time for Congress to step up.”

The problem? Democrats just don’t have the votes. The rest is hinged on hope.

This short episode on the Hill illustrates a much larger reality that Democrats will have to contend with next week as Congress returns from recess: their options to check the war are limited and depend entirely on whether any Republican will defect and rein in Trump’s power. And in Democrats’ own words, this spotlights a Congress that’s completely at the mercy of Trump’s whims with a war that’s now stretched 40 days, into a delicate ceasefire.

“We only need three Republicans to vote with us,” Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.), who sits both on the House Foreign Affairs and Armed Services committees, told reporters. “I hope that there are at least three, but many, many more of my Republican colleagues who see that this war is illegal, reckless, is expansive, is taking the United States into unprecedented territory.”

Democrats’ maneuverability will only shrink as Congress gavels back in. The Trump administration is pushing hard for hundreds of millions in a defense supplemental it wants Republicans to pass through a party-line reconciliation vote. That’s on top of the ongoing DHS shutdown, and a separate GOP reconciliation effort to fund ICE and CBP, if not possibly 3-plus years of funding for all of DHS. On both fronts, bipartisan compromise is not the name of the game. Democrats today flat out rejected the idea of backing any supplemental funding for the war, encouraging their colleagues to do the same.

Adding a layer of complication is the fact that much of Congress isn’t even clued into the terms of the ceasefire negotiations, including what happens with the Strait of Hormuz. “I don't even know all of the factual information, because we've got an administration that never tells us the truth,” Ivey told reporters. “So we're not exactly sure.” Jacobs told reporters her committees haven’t been read on the ceasefire deal, but that Democrats requested a briefing next week.

And then there’s the option that until now, the party has shied away from: removing Trump from office. Rep. Jaime Raskin (D-Md.) will lead a discussion with Democrats on the 25th Amendment tomorrow. And that’s just days after Democrats descended on Trump’s threat of erasing a “whole civilization” by calling for his impeachment. But they won’t meet a unified caucus.

Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) — a crucial player in Trump’s second impeachment — said pursuing impeachment or the 25th Amendment isn’t the “best use” of Democrats’ time. “He is eligible for and should be held to impeachment,” she told reporters. “But that's not the fight right now. Right now, we have to end this war.”

Which brings Democrats back to the failed war powers resolution. This fight isn’t over — Democrats today confirmed they expect another vote on the privileged resolution next week, and this time some of the previous Democrat nay-sayers are poised to sign on. The usual GOP defectors, as our Inside Congress colleagues noted this morning, so far haven’t broken ranks. That could change if the war stretches past the 60-day mark. In the Senate, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer faces an even steeper climb, with near total GOP opposition, but said he’ll also put it to a vote.

“We’re going to keep doing what we’ve been doing,” Dean told Playbook.

DEALMAKER IN CHIEF: “Trump asked Netanyahu to scale back Israel’s strikes in Lebanon,” by NBC’s Katherine Doyle: “Trump asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a phone call yesterday to scale back Israel’s strikes in Lebanon to help ensure the success of the Iran negotiations. … While the Trump administration and Israel have both said Lebanon is not covered by the ceasefire, Israel agreed ‘to be a helpful partner,’ the official said.”

Good Thursday afternoon. This is Ali Bianco and Makayla Gray. Thanks for reading Playbook PM. Drop us a line at abianco@politico.com and mgray@politico.com.

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8 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW

1. EXCLUSIVE: “Venezuela attempted to buy ballistic missile system from Iran in 2020,” by POLITICO’s Diana Nerozzi and Eric Bazail-Eimil: “[A] memo from within the Venezuelan Defense Ministry dated Jan. 17, 2020, described in detail to POLITICO by the two people, reveals that talks on the transfer of such missiles from Iran to Venezuela — which multiple administrations have viewed as a potential national security threat — was more extensive and progressed further than previously reported. … The memo — which outlined how the transaction would work and was approved by the country’s then-defense minister — provides tangible evidence Venezuela made moves to acquire a ballistic missile system.”

2. THE LEGEND OF ZELDIN: “At climate contrarian gathering, allies urge Trump to keep Zeldin at EPA,” by POLITICO’s E&E News’ Scott Waldman: “The Heartland Institute’s annual conference attracts a familiar crowd of fringe researchers who downplay climate science, their fans and the think tanks that use their work to fight against climate regulations. [EPA Administrator Lee] Zeldin, who has been rumored to be under consideration to replace Pam Bondi as attorney general, was a keynote speaker this year, the highest-ranking administration official to ever speak at the conference.”

3. QUITE THE MESSAGE: “A GOP-aligned group is using Klan imagery to target Black voters,” by WaPo’s Gregory Schneider: “Democrats, redistricting advocates and the NAACP are working to dispel what they call a disinformation campaign targeting African American and elderly voters ahead of Virginia’s April 21 referendum. … A Republican-aligned political action committee in Virginia called Democracy and Justice has used images and language from the civil rights movement to raise fears of gerrymandering, long wielded to marginalize Black political power. And the group’s ads recycle old statements against gerrymandering from both [Gov. Abigail] Spanberger and [Barack] Obama … to suggest that they oppose the referendum.”

Trail mix: Brice Barnes is launching her campaign for the Democratic nomination to replace retiring GOP Rep. Neal Dunn in Florida’s 2nd Congressional District. More in Florida Playbook

4. JUDICIARY SQUARE: A new analysis by WaPo shows that this Supreme Court is the first since at least the 1950s to reject civil rights claims in a majority of cases that involve women and minorities, per WaPo’s Justin Jouvenal. “The shift brings to an end a streak of successive courts expanding such protections that began with the dawn of the civil rights era. But the historic nature of the current court is also evident in other key areas of the law over the five terms since the third of Trump’s appointees joined the bench. … [This court] has pushed to the right of any modern court on religious rights and voting issues.”

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5. PIRRO’S PROBLEMS PERSIST: “Judges keep knocking down weak DC gun cases brought by Jeanine Pirro’s office,” by CNN’s Katelyn Polantz: “The Justice Department has had to drop illegal gun possession cases in recent months after judges on the federal trial-level court in DC have repeatedly found fatal flaws in the cases — largely because the guns were found during unconstitutional police searches.”

6. IMMIGRATION FILES: DHS and CBP is reporting an 11th straight month of zero releases at the southern border, per the Washington Examiner’s Christopher Tremoglie. This comes as the Trump administration has “systematically pressured the nation’s immigration judges, threatening them with disciplinary action if they do not deport more people and firing those seen as insufficiently supportive,” NYT’s Nicholas Nehamas and colleagues report. “So far, the Trump administration has dismissed more than 100 immigration judges out of about 750 in place when Mr. Trump returned to power, an unprecedented purge.”

On the border: “Inside the unbuilding of Trump’s border wall,” by Axios’ Brittany Gibson: “A West Texas revolt is erasing hundreds of miles of President Trump's planned border wall. The opposition in the Big Bend sector, which includes 517 miles of the southern border along the Rio Grande, is against the physical steel wall, not border security in general.”

7. HEALTH OF A NATION: Acting CDC Director Jay Bhattacharya has delayed releasing a report showing the Covid-19 vaccine “cut the likelihood of emergency department visits and hospitalizations for healthy adults last winter by about half,” WaPo’s Lena Sun scoops. The delay of the report, which was supposed to be released on March 19, “has raised concerns among current and former officials that information about the vaccine’s benefits are being downplayed because they conflict with the views of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has been an outspoken critic of the shots.”

8. UNDER THE INFLUENCE: A lobbying firm run by one of Donald Trump Jr.’s friends helped a Chinese business make an appeal to a U.S. national security watchdog, Reuters’ Alexandra Alper scooped. “The case involved a U.S. startup that was seeking to have the Chinese firm removed as one of its investors. The watchdog rejected the U.S. firm's request for a national security review of the Chinese firm's investment, according to a document seen by Reuters, handing a rare win to a Chinese company in Washington. … The lobbying firm, Checkmate, helped a lawyer for China's Grand Pharmaceutical Group clinch a meeting with the head of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS) in early January.”

A message from AHIP:

TALK OF THE TOWN

FLOTUS FILES — First lady Melania Trump, who has used her position to push for many foreign-aligned priorities, is making a “big” announcement this afternoon, per the NY Post's Emily Goodin. Her business adviser Marc Beckman “promised it would be news that would ‘spread internationally’ in the same vein as her first announcement on the release of children from Russia.”

HERE’S THE KICKER — The Justice Department is launching an investigation into the NFL probing whether the league engaged in “anticompetitive tactics that harm consumers,” WSJ’s Jessica Toonkel and Dana Mattioli report. “Media companies, regulators and members of Congress have raised concerns in recent months over how difficult it is for consumers to be able to watch their favorite sports games as a result of rights deals in which leagues offer smaller packages of games to streamers.”

OUT AND ABOUT — Widehall and Steve Clemons hosted a “How War is Scrambling the Global Race on Energy and Critical Minerals” event last night at Compass Coffee. SPOTTED: Ana Unruh Cohen, Mahnaz Khan, Peter Pudil, Frank Fannon, Heidi Crebo-Rediker, Jasper Jung, Will Cappelletti, Charles Johnson, Colin St. Maxens and Joshua Kaluwasha.

MEDIA MOVE — Jon Schlosberg has been named executive producer of ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos.” He previously has been senior producer for ABC News Live’s “Prime with Linsey Davis.”

TRANSITION — Carolyn Renzin is joining Airwallex as chief regulatory and compliance officer. She previously worked at FanDuel and JPMorgan.

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