{"id":10546,"date":"2025-06-23T12:03:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-23T12:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/capitol-agenda-how-johnson-may-block-an-iran-rebuke\/"},"modified":"2025-06-23T12:03:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-23T12:03:09","slug":"capitol-agenda-how-johnson-may-block-an-iran-rebuke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/capitol-agenda-how-johnson-may-block-an-iran-rebuke\/","title":{"rendered":"Capitol agenda: How Johnson may block an Iran rebuke"},"content":{"rendered":"
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President Donald Trump already had Republicans scrambling to get their \u201cbig, beautiful bill\u201d to his desk by next week. Now he\u2019s got Congress grappling with something even bigger: the aftermath of his airstrikes on Iran.<\/p>\n

The issue could come to a head with a vote as soon as this week. Sen. Tim Kaine\u2019s (D-Va.) resolution requiring congressional approval for military action in Iran ripens on Friday, but is expected to be on the floor sooner with the megabill set to eat up the back half of the week. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is pushing to move up the vote. He\u2019s urging his party to support the measure, but Democrats expect to lose the vote of Sen. John Fetterman (Pa.). On the GOP side, keep an eye on Sens. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), who said Sunday on X<\/a> \u201cCongress alone\u201d has the power to authorize war.<\/p>\n

Lawmakers in both chambers are set to receive briefings Tuesday on the situation in Iran; they were on the books before the strikes.<\/p>\n

In the House, Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Ro Khanna\u2019s (D-Calif.) war powers resolution, which would block U.S. involvement in Iran, will not ripen until next week. But House GOP leadership is considering getting ahead of that: Speaker Mike Johnson could move this week to kill the effort with language getting rid of the privileged nature of the resolution, according to a person granted anonymity to relay the private discussions.<\/p>\n

Trump and GOP leaders are moving to unify the rank-and-file behind Trump\u2019s decision to strike, even as Trump openly muses about pursuing regime change in Iran. Take note of Trump\u2019s renewed attacks on Massie \u2014 a source tells Blue Light News it\u2019s part of an effort to keep members in line.<\/p>\n

Adding to the chaos for Republicans is Trump\u2019s Sunday evening musing about pursuing \u201cregime change\u201d in Iran<\/a> if its current leaders can\u2019t \u201cMAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not America First folks,\u201d Massie said in response<\/a> to Trump\u2019s Truth Social post.<\/p>\n

House Democrats are less unified. Most are questioning the constitutionality of the strike, but the party is split on where to go from there. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) has brought up impeachment. Others, like Rep. Steny Hoyer (Md.), were more supportive of the strike. That could be a problem for Democrats trying to strengthen their opposition.<\/p>\n

The top Democrats on Foreign Affairs, Intelligence and Armed Services are drafting their own resolution in response to the strikes, according to a person granted anonymity to discuss the plan. <\/p>\n

There are likely a handful of pro-Israel Democrats who will vote against any war powers resolution. Even if the bill makes it to a House floor vote there likely won\u2019t be enough Republicans.<\/p>\n

What else we\u2019re watching:<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

\u2014 Megabill\u2019s big week: <\/b>Republicans will hold a closed-door meeting Monday night after votes for leadership to update members on the GOP megabill and its outstanding issues. Full bill text could land Monday, though it may also slip. While the \u201cbig, beautiful bill\u201d could hit the floor as soon as Wednesday, Thursday is looking more likely.<\/p>\n

\u2014 First Dem oversight vote: <\/b>House Democrats\u2019 steering committee will vote this evening on who should be the party\u2019s leader on the Oversight Committee, followed by a full caucus vote Tuesday. California Rep. Robert Garcia, 47, is seen as the favorite<\/a> in a field split along generational lines. He\u2019s running against Reps. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, 44; Kweisi Mfume of Maryland, 76; and Stephen Lynch of Massachusetts, 70.<\/p>\n

\u2014<\/b> Slashes to GAO funding: <\/b>House Republican appropriators are proposing to cut funding for the Government Accountability Office by nearly half<\/a>. It\u2019s the latest in a series of flashpoints<\/a> between the GOP and the watchdog agency, which has been involved in clashes this year over DOGE, regulatory rollbacks and Trump\u2019s incursions into the power of the purse.<\/p>\n

Meredith Lee Hill, Jordain Carney, Nicholas Wu and Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Donald Trump already had Republicans scrambling to get their \u201cbig, beautiful bill\u201d to his desk by next week. Now he\u2019s got Congress grappling with something even bigger: the aftermath of his airstrikes on Iran. The issue could come to a head with a vote as soon as this week. Sen. Tim Kaine\u2019s (D-Va.) resolution […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10546","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10546\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}