WASHINGTON – While President Donald Trump made a high-level, high-stakes trip to China this week accompanied by 17 corporate CEOs — including Cargill chief executive Brian Sikes — Congress refocused its attention on the Iran war.
An eighth vote was held Wednesday in the U.S. Senate on a war powers resolution that would rein in Trump’s ability to continue to prosecute the war. That effort failed on a narrow 49-50 vote. But it gained a new supporter as Sen Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, voted with all Democrats except Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman to try to impose Congress’ authority over the war.
Murkowski joined fellow Republicans Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Susan Collins of Maine in voting for the resolution, saying that the 60-day window during which the president can unilaterally take action without congressional approval had ended. Trump argues it has not because of the shaky cease fire he has established with Iran.
The U.S. House also tried to approve a war powers resolution late Thursday. The vote was tied, 212-212 and therefore the resolution was rejected. But as in the U.S. Senate, the effort in that chamber has had growing GOP support.
Trump says he does not need congressional approval to conduct the war.
Meanwhile, at a hearing this week, Rep. Betty McCollum, D-4th District, questioned Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth this week over the cost of the Iran war and the budgetary needs of the nation’s military.
The top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee with authority over the Pentagon’s budget, McCollum said the panel is still awaiting information about the Pentagon’s $1.5 trillion request to fund the Defense Department in fiscal year 2027 – a historically high budget for the nation’s military. She also said the panel needed details of a supplemental budget request, estimated to be more than $29 billion, to help pay for the Iran war.
“We are still waiting for that information,” McCollum said.
She told Hegseth that it took months for Congress to receive information about U.S. weapon shipments to Ukraine and that the Defense Department “must do better.”
She said Trump’s 2027 budget request increased defense spending by 44%, which the president proposed paying for with cuts to domestic programs, especially those concerning education.
She asked Hegseth for an accounting of munition levels, damage to war ships, military equipment that has been lost and additional fuel delivery cost as Iran’s lockdown of the Strait Hormuz has prevented oil tanker deliveries and resulted in a spike in the prices of gasoline and diesel.
She also said the panel needed details of the $1.5 trillion 2027 defense budget no later than June 11.
McCollum also asked Hegseth, if Congress is able to approve a war powers resolution that impacted U.S. military actions in Iran, “do you have a Plan B?”
“We have a plan for all of that. We have a plan to escalate if necessary. We have a plan to retrograde, if necessary. We have a plan to shift assets,” Hegseth said. “Certainly, in this setting we should not reveal what the next step would be considering the gravity of the situation.”
McCollum told Hegseth that lawmakers could be briefed in a secure location and said she also wanted that information by June 11.
“I will not support a blank check for the Pentagon,” McCollum told MinnPost. “The Trump administration’s budget request must be closely scrutinized. They have failed thus far to provide information to Congress to justify such an extraordinary budget request, and they have failed to provide a plan to pay for it in the long-term.”
Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee also asked Hegseth to send Congress a final request for supplemental funding to cover the costs incurred by the war in Iran.
“It would be helpful to get the supplemental sooner than later so we could work on it,” he said.
That war supplement would not account for the damage Iran has caused to U.S. bases in the Middle East, Jules Hurst, the Pentagon’s acting comptroller, told lawmakers.
An analysis published last week by the Washington Post showed that Iranian forces had damaged or destroyed at least 228 U.S. structures or pieces of equipment since the war began Feb. 28, including aircraft and hangars, barracks, fuel depots, radar and air defense equipment.
There was also bipartisan frustration about the conduct of the war at the hearing.
Rep. Harold Rogers, R-Ky., said it had “confirmed what defense planners had long warned about: Iran doesn’t need a peer military to cause serious problems.”
In other news:
▪️ Reporters Matthew Blake, Brian Arola, and Maddie Robinson are among the MinnPost reporters following the flurry of activity as the state Legislature wraps up its session, including an agreement for a bailout of the financially distressed Hennepin County Medical Center and a $1.2 billion bonding bill, as well as unexpected tax relief.
▪️ Metro reporter Trevor Mitchell also covered the state Legislature this week as it approved $40 million for emergency rental assistance and $100 million in bonds to support the maintenance and development of affordable homes. There’s also a little money in the bill to combat homelessness.
▪️ Congress gave Midwestern farmers a big victory this week as the U.S. House voted to allow nationwide sales of E15 all year long. But opposition from small gasoline and diesel distillers may make it difficult for the E15 legislation to win approval in the U.S. Senate.
▪️ Michele Tafoya’s bid for retiring Sen. Tina Smith’s seat is strongly supported by the national Republican Party. But not all of the GOP activists in the state who will decide whether to endorse Tafoya or one several other Republicans running for the seat, are sold on the former broadcaster.
The post D.C. Memo: McCollum has tough questions for Hegseth appeared first on MinnPost.
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