- Deadline comes as Iran sends new peace proposal.
- The war shook markets, raised prices and angered consumers.
- An unpopular conflict continues six months before the US elections.
US President Donald Trump’s administration claimed a ceasefire with Tehran had “ended” hostilities, as the legal deadline arrived Friday to address Congress over Iran’s two-month-old war.
Under the War Powers Resolution of 1973, the president can only conduct military action for 60 days before terminating it, either by seeking authorization from Congress or by requesting a 30-day extension due to “unavoidable military necessity relating to the security of the United States armed forces” during the withdrawal of forces.
The war began on February 28, when Israel and the United States launched airstrikes against Iran. On Friday, Iran’s official IRNA news agency said Tehran had sent its latest proposal for negotiations with the United States to Pakistani mediators.
Trump formally informed Congress of the conflict 48 hours after the first airstrikes, beginning the 60-day deadline that ends May 1.
As that date approaches, congressional advisers and analysts have said they expect the Republican president to skirt the deadline. A senior Trump administration official said Thursday that the administration believes the War Powers Act deadline does not apply.
“For purposes of the War Powers Resolution, the hostilities that began on Saturday, February 28 have ended,” the official said, requesting anonymity while describing the administration’s thinking.
No way out: Democratic senator
Congressional Democrats, who have repeatedly tried to pass war powers legislation that would require Trump to end the war or seek authorization from Congress, have rejected that characterization, saying nothing in the 1973 law authorized a cease-fire.
They also said the continued deployment of U.S. ships blocking Iranian oil exports was evidence of continued hostility, not a ceasefire.
“After sixty days of conflict, President Trump still has no strategy or way out of this poorly planned war,” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement calling the deadline a “clear legal threshold” for Trump to act.
Loyalty to the party as elections approach
Trump’s fellow Republicans, who hold slim majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives and rarely part ways with Trump, voted almost unanimously to block any resolution to end the conflict.
The war in Iran has killed thousands, caused billions of dollars in damage and shaken global markets, disrupting energy shipments and driving up a wide range of consumer prices.
Polls show the war is unpopular among Americans, six months before the November elections that will determine who controls Congress next year.
Trump’s approval rating fell this week to the lowest level of his current term, with Americans blaming the war for rising prices.
The U.S. Constitution states that only Congress, not the president, can declare war, but this restriction does not apply to short-term operations or to counter an immediate threat.
On Thursday, Trump received a briefing on plans for new military strikes aimed at forcing Iran to negotiate an end to the conflict.
If fighting resumes, Trump will be able to tell lawmakers he has started a new 60-day clock. Presidents of both parties have done this repeatedly when waging intermittent hostilities since Congress passed the War Powers Act in response to the Vietnam War.
This conflict, largely unpopular with Americans, was also not authorized by Congress.
