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Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) speaks at a news conference. (Photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Sanders Launches Petition Urging Lawmakers to Block Military Action Against Iran Without Congressional Approval
War with Iran, warned the senator and 2020 candidate, "will be an unmitigated disaster."
May 17, 2019
As heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran continue to provoke warnings of potential war, Sen. Bernie Sanders released a petition Thursday calling on federal lawmakers to "pass legislation that would prohibit military action against Iran without congressional approval."
"A war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster," Sanders tweeted Thursday evening from his presidential campaign account.
\u201cA war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster.\n\nTell Congress to pass legislation that would prohibit Trump from taking military action against Iran without Congressional approval: https://t.co/zzwVU8sech\u201d— Bernie Sanders (@Bernie Sanders) 1558044144
The petition followed the senator's impassioned online address Tuesday night, during which he declared, "The United States Congress must do everything it can to prevent the Trump administration's attempts to put us on the brink of a catastrophic and unconstitutional war with Iran that could lead to even more deaths than the Iraq War."
Sanders also referenced the devastating U.S. war with Iraq in an email encouraging supporters of his presidential campaign to sign the petition:
[It] is almost beyond impossible to imagine that after the horrors of the war in Iraq--a war that upended the regional order of the Middle East and resulted in an untold loss of life--that this administration would put us on such a dangerous path toward more war. But every day we see a new story about how this administration is trying provoke conflict, like sending huge bombers to the region, or raising the possibility of sending more than 100,000 troops.
Apparently for some, almost two decades of constant war is not enough.
Well, unfortunately for this president and people like John Bolton who love endless wars, the constitutional authority for declaring war rests with the United States Congress--not the president--no matter if that president is a Democrat or a Republican.
The senator's call to halt President Donald Trump's march to war with Iran comes as foreign policy experts and peace advocates challenge his administration's narrative of a supposedly increasing Iranian threat. Critics charge that the president, Bolton--Trump's national security adviser--and other hawkish aides are to blame for the recent escalations, rather than Iranian officials.
Although Trump reportedly told Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan earlier this week that he does not want to go to war with Iran, his administration's moves over the past two weeks suggest otherwise. Such moves, as Common Dreams reported, include Bolton using "the scheduled deployment of an American aircraft carrier and bomber task force to the Middle East to threaten Iran with military action."
Sanders, in his Thursday email, countered the Trump administration's approach to Iran, writing that "real American power is not demonstrated by our ability to blow things up, but our ability to forge international consensus around shared challenges."
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As heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran continue to provoke warnings of potential war, Sen. Bernie Sanders released a petition Thursday calling on federal lawmakers to "pass legislation that would prohibit military action against Iran without congressional approval."
"A war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster," Sanders tweeted Thursday evening from his presidential campaign account.
\u201cA war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster.\n\nTell Congress to pass legislation that would prohibit Trump from taking military action against Iran without Congressional approval: https://t.co/zzwVU8sech\u201d— Bernie Sanders (@Bernie Sanders) 1558044144
The petition followed the senator's impassioned online address Tuesday night, during which he declared, "The United States Congress must do everything it can to prevent the Trump administration's attempts to put us on the brink of a catastrophic and unconstitutional war with Iran that could lead to even more deaths than the Iraq War."
Sanders also referenced the devastating U.S. war with Iraq in an email encouraging supporters of his presidential campaign to sign the petition:
[It] is almost beyond impossible to imagine that after the horrors of the war in Iraq--a war that upended the regional order of the Middle East and resulted in an untold loss of life--that this administration would put us on such a dangerous path toward more war. But every day we see a new story about how this administration is trying provoke conflict, like sending huge bombers to the region, or raising the possibility of sending more than 100,000 troops.
Apparently for some, almost two decades of constant war is not enough.
Well, unfortunately for this president and people like John Bolton who love endless wars, the constitutional authority for declaring war rests with the United States Congress--not the president--no matter if that president is a Democrat or a Republican.
The senator's call to halt President Donald Trump's march to war with Iran comes as foreign policy experts and peace advocates challenge his administration's narrative of a supposedly increasing Iranian threat. Critics charge that the president, Bolton--Trump's national security adviser--and other hawkish aides are to blame for the recent escalations, rather than Iranian officials.
Although Trump reportedly told Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan earlier this week that he does not want to go to war with Iran, his administration's moves over the past two weeks suggest otherwise. Such moves, as Common Dreams reported, include Bolton using "the scheduled deployment of an American aircraft carrier and bomber task force to the Middle East to threaten Iran with military action."
Sanders, in his Thursday email, countered the Trump administration's approach to Iran, writing that "real American power is not demonstrated by our ability to blow things up, but our ability to forge international consensus around shared challenges."
As heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran continue to provoke warnings of potential war, Sen. Bernie Sanders released a petition Thursday calling on federal lawmakers to "pass legislation that would prohibit military action against Iran without congressional approval."
"A war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster," Sanders tweeted Thursday evening from his presidential campaign account.
\u201cA war in Iran would make the Iraq war look like a walk in the park. It will be an unmitigated disaster.\n\nTell Congress to pass legislation that would prohibit Trump from taking military action against Iran without Congressional approval: https://t.co/zzwVU8sech\u201d— Bernie Sanders (@Bernie Sanders) 1558044144
The petition followed the senator's impassioned online address Tuesday night, during which he declared, "The United States Congress must do everything it can to prevent the Trump administration's attempts to put us on the brink of a catastrophic and unconstitutional war with Iran that could lead to even more deaths than the Iraq War."
Sanders also referenced the devastating U.S. war with Iraq in an email encouraging supporters of his presidential campaign to sign the petition:
[It] is almost beyond impossible to imagine that after the horrors of the war in Iraq--a war that upended the regional order of the Middle East and resulted in an untold loss of life--that this administration would put us on such a dangerous path toward more war. But every day we see a new story about how this administration is trying provoke conflict, like sending huge bombers to the region, or raising the possibility of sending more than 100,000 troops.
Apparently for some, almost two decades of constant war is not enough.
Well, unfortunately for this president and people like John Bolton who love endless wars, the constitutional authority for declaring war rests with the United States Congress--not the president--no matter if that president is a Democrat or a Republican.
The senator's call to halt President Donald Trump's march to war with Iran comes as foreign policy experts and peace advocates challenge his administration's narrative of a supposedly increasing Iranian threat. Critics charge that the president, Bolton--Trump's national security adviser--and other hawkish aides are to blame for the recent escalations, rather than Iranian officials.
Although Trump reportedly told Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan earlier this week that he does not want to go to war with Iran, his administration's moves over the past two weeks suggest otherwise. Such moves, as Common Dreams reported, include Bolton using "the scheduled deployment of an American aircraft carrier and bomber task force to the Middle East to threaten Iran with military action."
Sanders, in his Thursday email, countered the Trump administration's approach to Iran, writing that "real American power is not demonstrated by our ability to blow things up, but our ability to forge international consensus around shared challenges."
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Trump Blasted for Attack on Reproductive Care Across Numerous States
This is "a deeply unpopular and politically motivated attack on Planned Parenthood and reproductive freedom that will disproportionately harm families who are already struggling to make ends meet," said one advocate.
Apr 01, 2025
Critics are decrying the Trump administration's freeze of tens of millions of dollars for the reproductive care provider Planned Parenthood—money that's meant to provide low-income Americans contraception access, cancer screenings, and other crucial services.
Nine Planned Parenthood state affiliates received notice on Monday that the administration is withholding Title X funding effective Tuesday, according to a Monday statement from Planned Parenthood Action Fund.
Since 1970, Title X has provided federal funding to a network of grantees who provide sexual and reproductive healthcare with a focus on serving low-income patients.
In total, the Trump administration is withholding payments to 16 Title X providers, per Politico, citing a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). According to the journalist Jessica Valenti, 21 states will be impacted, and eight states—California, Hawaii, Maine, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, Tennessee, and Utah—will cease receiving Title X dollars.
U.S. President Donald Trump and his billionaire adviser Elon Musk are "pushing their dangerous political agenda, stripping healthcare access from people nationwide, and not giving a second thought to the devastation they will cause," said Alexis McGill Johnson, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Action Fund, in a statement on Monday.
"We know what happens when healthcare providers cannot use Title X funding: People across the country suffer, cancers go undetected, access to birth control is severely reduced, and the nation's [sexually transmitted infections] crisis worsens," she added.
Mini Timmaraju, president and CEO of the advocacy group Reproductive Freedom for All, called the move "a deeply unpopular and politically motivated attack on Planned Parenthood and reproductive freedom that will disproportionately harm families who are already struggling to make ends meet."
According to a letter sent to Planned Parenthood chapters, which Politico reviewed, the funding is being "temporarily withheld," citing potential violations of federal civil rights law and Trump's executive orders, including prohibitions on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts. For example, public statements that emphasize "commitment to Black communities" are cited as evidence of Planned Parenthood's noncompliance, per Politico.
The administration's move to freeze the funding was first reported by The Wall Street Journal last week. The paper reported that HHS was considering a freeze of $27.5 million in grants to groups that would include Planned Parenthood affiliates while the administration investigates whether the money was used on DEI efforts.
In response to that reporting, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said in a statement last week that "it's clear Trump and Elon couldn't care less how many people suffer, whose cancer goes undetected, or if women can no longer afford birth control as a result of their deranged mission to attack anything they deem DEI—no matter the consequences to real people's lives, and no matter the fact that this administration can't even define DEI."
Valenti reported Monday that the Title X funding freeze tallies close to $35 million, and highlighted that it will impact not only Planned Parenthood affiliates. One of the impacted organizations is Converge, Inc.—Mississippi's only Title X grantee. According to a letter from HHS obtained by Valenti, Converge, Inc. came under scrutiny in part due to a document titled "Our Commitment to Addressing Systemic Racism."
"Without federal funding—funding that runs out today—they will shutter," wrote Valenti of Converge, Inc. "The 90 Mississippi clinics under their purview will be in jeopardy of closing, and the tens of thousands of women who rely on them for care will have nowhere to go. All because they opposed racism."
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"If Trump can disappear Abrego Garcia, he can disappear you," warned one advocate. "This is why due process matters. Without it, America slides into dictatorship."
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"This is the precedent Trump needs to send you to a concentration camp," said one advocate for due process rights as President Donald Trump's administration claimed it had made an "administrative error" in sending a Maryland father to a prison in his home country of El Salvador—leaving the federal government with no way of bringing him back to his children and wife, a U.S. citizen.
In a court filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, an acting field office director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Robert L. Cerna, told Judge Paula Xinis that the removal of Kilmar Abrego Garcia on March 15 "was in error." Abrego Garcia was one of hundreds of people rounded up by the Trump administration and sent to a "Terrorism Confinement Center" in El Salvador, with the White House invoking the Alien Enemies Act for the first time since World War II and claiming many were members of gangs including MS-13 and Tren de Aragua.
Cerna's filing reveals the result of a mass expulsion operation in which hundreds of people were afforded no due process rights in violation of the U.S. Constitution: At least one person with legal protected status in the United States who was not convicted of a crime is now imprisoned in a country where a U.S. federal court had previously found he could face persecution and torture.
As Joshua Eakle of Project Liberal warned, Abrego Garcia's detention and the administration's claim that it can do nothing to help him also creates precedent for Trump to do the same to anyone else it sees fit to target.
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As the news spread of Abrego Garcia's mistaken expulsion, Vice President JD Vance "smeared him as a 'convicted gang member,'" claiming to cite the court filing from Monday, and accused podcast host Jon Favreau of having sympathy for "gang members getting deported while ignoring citizens they victimize."
Cerna's filing states that Abrego Garcia was denied bond in 2019 because "the evidence show[ed] that he is a verified member of [Mara Salvatrucha] ('MS-13')]" and therefore posed a danger to the community." As Kyle Cheney wrote at Politico, the accusation was "sharply contested" by Abrego Garcia and "credited to information gleaned from a confidential informant."
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Further, noted Cheney, the court at the time found that Abrego Garcia was likely a member of MS-13, but that he had a credible fear of persecution in his home country of El Salvador and should not be deported there—or expelled via an operation like Trump's mass expulsion campaign, in which those sent overseas have not been afforded due process.
Vance's claim that Abrego Garcia is a "convicted gang member" was "a lie," said Krystal Ball of the online news show "Breaking Points."
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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the American Immigration Council said it was "shocking that the vice president of the United States would so callously, and so falsely, accuse someone of being a convicted gang member. It's especially bad when his own administration just admitted to illegally deporting that person due to 'administrative error.'"
Trump's Justice Department is now urging Xinis to reject a petition filed by Abrego Garcia's attorneys to secure his return to the U.S., saying that since the Maryland resident is now in custody in his home country, the administration and the court system can't force El Salvador to return him.
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Shannon Watts, founder of the gun violence prevention group Moms Demand Action, called on the Democratic Party to ensure the administration can't ignore the demand for Abrego Garcia's release.
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An effort by the Trump administration to unilaterally strip the temporary protected status (TPS) of approximately 350,000 Venezuelan refugees living in the United States was blocked Monday night by a federal court judge who described the order by Secretary of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem as being "motivated by unconstitutional animus."
In a 78-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in San Francisco said Noem's rescinding of an order made under the Biden administration "threatens to: inflict irreparable harm on hundreds of thousands of persons whose lives, families, and livelihoods will be severely disrupted, cost the United States billions in economic activity, and injure public health and safety in communities throughout the United States. At the same time, the government has failed to identify any real countervailing harm in continuing TPS for Venezuelan beneficiaries."
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Chen said the TPS holders who acted as plaintiffs in the case—represented by the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON), the ACLU Foundations of Northern California and Southern California, the Center for Immigration Law and Policy (CILP) at UCLA School of Law, and HBA—were likely to prevail on the merits, showing that Noem's order was "unauthorized by law, arbitrary and capricious, and motivated by unconstitutional animus."
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