Democratic Party leaders are doing nothing to oppose Trump’s war plans for Iran because they support those plans. They just don’t want to be the ones pulling the trigger.
Chuck Schumer has gone silent on Iran. (Victoria Pickering/Flickr)
By Caitlin Johnstone
Caitlin’s Newsletter
Reading by Tim Foley
The Wall Street Journal reports that the U.S. has been gathering the most air power seen in the Middle East since the Iraq invasion in 2003.
CNN says the U.S. military is prepared to strike Iran as early as this weekend.
A Trump advisor has reportedly told Axios: “The boss is getting fed up. Some people around him warn him against going to war with Iran, but I think there is 90 percent chance we see kinetic action in the next few weeks.”
The U.S. is by every indication headed straight toward war with Iran, and Trump’s ostensible opposition has conspicuously little to say about it.
We’re seeing some pushback from House Democrats like Ro Khanna, but party leaders like Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer are completely missing from the scene on this issue of unparalleled urgency.
No one is asking democrats to “stop it”, they are asking the two most powerful democrats, Jeffries and Schumer, to issue a single word of opposition. Not responding to reporters with vague process criticisms, but issue firm and clear legal and moral objections to war with Iran. https://t.co/0PJLITv74r
— Adam Johnson (@adamjohnsonCHI) February 19, 2026
Schumer had last year said Trump needed Congreessional approval to strike Iran. But now he’s gone silent when it matters most.
It is fair to say that Democratic Party leaders are doing nothing to oppose Trump’s war plans for Iran because they quietly support those plans. They just don’t want to be the ones pulling the trigger.
When the attack begins they’ll do the same thing they did with Venezuela: publicly finger-wag about rules and protocol while providing no meaningful resistance and privately being glad the empire took out another unauthorized leader.
Democratic Party empire managers seem to secretly love Trump. They love having a bad cop who’s willing to get his hands dirty and slit the throats that need slitting while they sit back looking pretty and fundraise off his depravity.
Democrats hate having to be the bad guy. They hated trying to come up with excuses for why it was fine for Biden to aggressively back a live-streamed genocide in Gaza, and they were relieved to finally hand off that PR nightmare to Trump.
Now they get to just coast along and let Trump take the blame for all the imperial depravity.
On Wednesday, Democratic Senator Mark Warner told MS NOW’s Katy Tur, “I think it’s appropriate that the president has all the options on the table” with regard to war with Iran, complaining only that Trump was too incompetent to strike last month when Iranian domestic turmoil was at its peak.
Warner said that “seeing regime change in Iran would make sense” and made it clear that he would like to see the Iranian government removed, with his only criticism being that Trump was going about obtaining it in a clumsy and impolite way.
“First of all, remember the president said in our previous bombing that we had obliterated Iran’s nuclear program,” Warner said.
“While clearly our military did an exquisite job, we did not obliterate Iran’s nuclear program, number one. Number two, if the president is calling for regime change in Iran?—?and Iran is an awful regime?—?but he should make the case to the American public and to the world of how we’re going to go about doing that.”
This is such a perfect example of the Democratic Party’s relationship with all of Trump’s most depraved agendas.
Here’s this monstrous warmonger, poised to unleash violence in the middle east of potentially devastating consequence, and all Warner can do is hem and haw about proper war etiquette and criticize the president for failing to drop enough bombs on Iran’s nuclear energy infrastructure.
The United States has two right wing war parties: the polite one and the rude one. No party or faction which advances peace and human interests is allowed to flourish at the heart of the empire.
Trump is responsible for the war crimes of his administration, and he belongs in a cell in The Hague. But these Republican swamp monsters wouldn’t be able to do the damage they do without the assistance of the Democratic Party.
Caitlin Johnstone’s work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following her on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud, YouTube, or throwing some money into her tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal. If you want to read more you can buy her books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff she publishes is to subscribe to the mailing list at her website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything she publishes. For more info on who she is, where she stands and what she’s trying to do with her platform, click here. All works are co-authored with her American husband Tim Foley.
This article is from Caitlin’s Newsletter and re-published with permission.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
Duh, of course the Democrats back a war on Iran. They always have. Democrats love war. Its a chance for lots of new medals for all their Generals who are their BFF’s over in the Pentagon. Its a great chance for their corporate partners in the Merchants of Death to make lots of money. Its a great chance for their corporate partners in the banks that are too big to fail to make lots of money. The Democrats always are sure Hate-Iran votes. And on top of that, the Democrats love war, anywhere, anytime.
The only ‘news’ is the quiet part. The Democrats appear to think that being ‘quiet’ is the key to their financial success from regaining power in at least one house in Congress. That way they can get back to raking in the bucks from being in the majority.
Duh is right! Speaking of raking in the bucks, Ole Trumpinstein and his buddies are doing a bank up, pardon the pun, job of it while HE, Fuax potus and his cult continue their perverse ways of life.
The news is Trump got illegal help help winning both of his ‘victories’. It is what happens when billionaires control politics.
The two major parties combine to make a single War Party. It has been that way for a very long time. Not since the latter stages of the Vietnam War did significant numbers of Congress members deviate from that posture. Also, Schumer might as well be the Senator from Tel Aviv, except for the fact that Lindsey Graham has already claimed that title.
It is not ‘quiet’ nor ‘secret’ that the Dems share the goals of the empire. Hillary Clinton (one example) favored limiting her campaign for president to the coin-toss between her and Trump, for more reason than one.
But I appreciate this article for reinforcing this point!
and I like the comment, “Fill the Hague”.
I have stated before, “The dimocraps have a notable history of being able to fuck up a train wreck. Not cause one, they are not capable! But fucking one up which has already happened, this they have a proven record of. How is much worse than just kneeling to Israeli leaders bullshit, you know genocide and the like!!! Tell the DIMO’s are in very thin ice in the mental acuity department here. Much crazier.
No more wars of choice is the proper direction to move here.
No sugar coating the fact that something is terribly off in Congress. Trump is not worthy of any response to his insanity other than NO DICE Richard Krainium! .
No emergency exits justifying joining the defense of Israel. Not any I’m aware of currently. No more wars of choice.
Some one please! Quick! Quick give this idiot a roll of aluminum foil!
If humans are to survive into the future, it seems clear we will have to find a way to prevent psychopaths from accessing powerful positions. Studies have shown they have a talent for climbing the ladder to powerful positions in both the government and corporate worlds. They have brought us to an existential global crisis. This is not an abstract issue. We must figure this out.
Support and encourage Empathy. An Empath is the opposite of a Psychopath.
Yet, America is the nation that encourages psychopaths and rewards them. When an American says something psychopathic, such as “Winning isn’t everything, its the only thing”, America responds by making them into a hero. While America treats Empaths as ‘losers’. Psychopaths will always have the most toys.
—–
Defuse power. Concentrated power will always attract psychopaths. If you want freedom and liberty, defuse the power. If a society creates positions where power is concentrated, they are both building the tool of their own oppression, and attracting psychopaths to be their oppressors.
The Epstein class needs to be removed from rule. We need true representative democracy: look up Sortition … it is the only way to achieve government of the people by the people.
As George Wallace opined in 1963, “There’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the Democratic and Republican parties”
It may have been questionable in 1963, but it isn’t now – the current white hot rhetoric against Iran out of the White House and Congress is bi-partisan – the present grovelling subordination of the White House and Congress towards Israeli military objectives is bi-partisan – it is as if there is a contest to show who has the greatest fidelity towards Israel – ultimately, eventually to the determent of the USA.
G.M. I voted for Wallace in the 1976 primaries. It was as bad or worse then because of the candidates. The economy was tough with energy prices through the roof. Next four years of gridlock in congress then Raygun shows up, Iran Contra crack cocaine epidemic out west all sponsored by the Cocaine Import Agency in conjunction with the Drug Economic Assistance Squadron headed by Ollie ‘I Love the Constitution’ North singing Lawyers, Guns and Money – Warren Zevon – RIP!
The Shit Has Hit the Fan! Time for infidels to pay.
We have a religious devotion to war as the western drive for male military dominance behavior as if it is a genetic necessity that has to be logically promoted as a protection racket for profits even if it kills us . In most species they stop short of suicide as illogical.
Sexism is so out of date. Nowadays, we have female generals and female politicians to lead us all into death and destruction. We’ve made completely certain that its no longer a ‘male’ thing. (insert pictures of PM Margaret Thatcher, Sec Hillary Clinton, FM Annalena Baerbock, Gen. Lori Robinson and EUFM Kaja Kallas)
Thanks much. Excellent. Our government seems incompetent of clear thought. More negotiation is needed and less desire to grab a gun, bomb, missal, etc. We must revive the United Nations and be aware of the “military-industrials goals. More and more people on the planet means more and more shortages of food, clothing, shelter, clean air and water. Their are limits to growth and this causses the competition and and shortages of these items strife between countries. People are not informed and go mostly for the national pride and and do not get wise ideas for solving the problems we are talking about. Electorate is week and nationalistic as I just mentioned. We need thoughtful leaders like Jeffrey Sacs. The classic voting system where money runs things is going to destroy us. Particularly when the “dooms day clock” gets closer and closer to midnight. Better education of the public is needed. Where shall that come from?
“Better education of the public is needed. Where shall that come from?”
Teach-Ins used to be a thing.
People used to start Free Schools, where they could teach people what they really needed to know.
Who is going to organize the first Teach-In in 60 years?
The League of Nations = Failure
The United Nations = Failure.
The root cause is that a world of capitalist nations can never find peace. Capitalism is based on competition. Capitalism is always a fight to be the Top Dog on top of the dogpile. A world of nations who will always be competing against each other will never find peace. Thus, the word “Nations” in the names of both failed organizations points directly to the cause of the failure.
At least at the end of the World War that resulted from the failure of the League of Nations, some people, a minority unfortunately, recognized that “Nationalism” had been one of the causes of that World War. Today, the oligarchs have convinced everyone to love nationalism, and thus any attempt to “revive the UN” will be doomed to failure because a system of Capitalism Nations will never find peace. And no one at all is talking about doing anything about the nations and their nationalism that are the root cause of all of this death and destruction.
I remember a paperback I saw laying around when I was a kid .
Its title was the same as my title above .
Is it not frightening to listen to members of Congress who are not only without a shred of moral integrity, a complete lack of understanding the consequences of their words? The level of idiocy that exists throughout our government hardly begins nor ends with Trump. We need to clean house!
and then there is the idiocy of those in media who feed into this horror.
They aren’t idiots. It’s a question of values. They get rich by serving Big Money and will continue to do so.
And what of the lack of moral integrity, complete lack of understanding the consequences, and above all, the idiocy of those who voted him into office, for a second term?
As opposed to the idiocy of those who voted for Genocide Joe and Killer Kam? We’d have a President who’d be joining Europe in a massive war to defeat Russia because we couldn’t possibly let Russia win in Ukraine. That is the gospel according to the War Democrats. We would probably be bombing Iran already, because Iran is friendly to Russia and with a Dem+EU war on Russia we’d probably attack Iran as well.
That they were the only real choice is the result of the actions of the Fake Left, of course. Bernie bizarrely completely disappeared from the contest. This is typical for the Fake Left.
The Fake Left exists only to keep the Real Left from organizing outside the corporate Democratic Party. Since it takes time to organize a people-powered movement, the Fake Left is vocal between elections with Fake claims that the corporate Democratic Party can be Reformed into something that is not Evil. This continues until it is too late to organize, then the Fake Left shifts its message to “Vote for Joe Biden.”
The endgame for the Fake Left is always to tell the Real Left that they must vote for Genocide Joe or Killer Kam or Harpy Hillary or whomever the Mega-Donors have picked for the next War Leader. Thus, were people idiots for voting against World War III after Millionaire Bernie and the Fake Left had made sure that the only alternative to Trump was Killer Kam? (if one did not want to cast a meaningless protest vote like I did by voting for a university professor in a nation that loves stupid.)
Excellent ?! But we also need to wake up and educate the brain dead masses. May I suggest that we start by making “Center Right “ a dirty word ?
“Centrist” is already a curse word used to denote lack of character and the sort of evil that kills human souls by the tens of thousands at a time.
Warner and all of the others members of Congress need to understand that War is not the answer. It never is!
Of course, war IS the answer … the answer to the question how can $$$ be moved into 0.1% pockets most efficiently.
I agree, Trump is a monstrous warmonger but he is dancing to the “Piper’s” tune. The Democrats, the Republicans, the Congress, the President, the Judicial, the Treasury Dept. The Fed, The War Dept. the Intelligence Services and the MSM are ALL tapping their toes to music that’s been composed by the ZIONISTS.
What we’re experiencing is a a real life version of the movie “The Body Snatchers”. We’ve all been listening to this music since we were born…it has become the normal background theme of our lives…no wonder we can’t figure out how to fix ourselves. We’ve all been born and bred for one grand purpose…to support ZIONISM.
Of course the Democrats should be leading the resistance against this poisonous atmosphere. They should remember that they are the “party of the PEOPLE”…all the PEOPLE. They should boldly and proudly stand against the apartheid and genocide that the Zionist have rained down upon the natives of Palestine (and the entire mid-east). If they only chose this course they would WIN, WIN, WIN…but because they are bought off cowards….they cannot imagine a world without the music of Zionism.
I can. Many of us can. We are no longer Democrats…or Republicans…or Christian Zionists…or Jewish Zionists..or Muslims…but we are all humans.
Let us begin a new Party. I propose we assume the acronym “BOB’s Party” for “Best Of Both” as our title. Let us aspire to promote both, individual excellence and social equality. Let us seek to unite, not divide ourselves. We should attempt form an all inclusive association of humans from both the left and the right to endeavor to coexist in peace…and sustain the Planet. We must be united to stand against all the other non-inclusive power seeking organizations, such as Zionism. Beyond that, I’m open to suggestions.
Chuck Schumer is an Israel First man….so naturally, he’d be pro Israel/usa Iran War. He must be primaried. He uses his influence
to always benefit Israel, even when doing so helps shred into pieces our rights of assembly and speech and incrementally destroy democracy. I’d sure like to see a journalistic listing of Congress members whose actions demonstrate Israel First. stance Ritter, Wilkerson and other military and intelligence experts (retired) together have stated Iran constitutes no threat to the USA security; the only reason to destroy Iran is FOR Israel.
Fill The Hague.
Graeme beat me to it to call out the Orwellian NewSpeak term “kinetic action”, meaning mass murder.
We do indeed have two right wing, authoritarian, corrupt criminal organizations that control Congress: the so-called Democrats and Republicans. Both of these factions have Orwellian names as well. As we know, the oligarchy have Congress bought and paid for, the US has no functioning democracy. The US is a lawless, rogue empire bent on increasingly desperate and reckless acts to try to maintain hegemony.
All factions of oligarchy support war, Big Oil is drooling at the prospect of getting the oil and natural gas action. the idiot emperor has stated he wants India to buy Venezuelan oil, not from Iran or Russia. They want to cut China off of Iran’s oil as well. And we don’t want to forget the huge reserves of natural gas, control of one of most important geostrategic locations, blocking China’s BRI, pipeline routes and of course the Zionists will be happy as well. So for the US, a war on Iran is a win-win.
So we see Congress puppets doing the bidding of the oligarchy, just like the Kleptocrat In Chief. Yet folks still believe in the fairy-tale of US democracy. Just one more “election” and we can fix this mess. Haven’t we heard that before?
Simply put, the ironically named Democratic Party is the party of bait and switch. It’s the place where progressive values go to die, a fifth column action to dissipate the public’s wish for meaningful change away from wealth concentration, war and conflict, and environmental destruction. In this way, it is more diabolical than the GOP. With honest hopes for change, the public goes to the DP where they get window dressing and vacuous rhetoric while their aspirations for real change are quietly flushed down the toilet. Whenever the desire for progressive change rises up, the DP rises up to strangle it. At least with the GOP, you can see the opposition and challenge it. The GOP gains power and pushes against democracy and the rule of law. Then the DP gains power and normalizes the GOP gains and on we go toward a neo-feudal society of few nobles and many serfs (chattel). Better to have a clear idea where you stand and unite against it. Until the public unites, no change is possible and so long as the DP exists to prevent that unity, the status quo only worsens.
Democrats and Republicans belong to the same party; the War party.
A simple question:
What is the Australian government doing to oppose Trump’s war plans for Iran that demonstrates they do NOT support those plans?
How is Australia’s Uniparty system today any different from that of the U.S. Uniparty regime?
Will grandiose Australia be the one to pull the trigger against the U.S. hegemonic state.
How do Caitlin Johnstone’s, or any other journalist’s legitimate conjectures not add fuel to the fire of the distractions already in play?
Is not “pointing the finger” at the ‘other’ an accusation – a form of bias; as the West is expressing towards the Palestinian people’s heroic resistance, against their being genocided?
Is Australia or the U.S. coming to their aid?
NO! It is Iran.
Hence the long-running facsimile Führer regimes ‘Make Germany Great Again’ slogan transmogrified into (M.A.G.A.) war plans against Iran.
Incontrovertibly, “humanity’s flag” is the diametrical opposite of its dictionary definition.
The Dem’s may not “know what a woman is,” but they sure clearly know and understand the relationship between their own stock portfolio and the profitability of war. Could America’s bi-partisan political class be anymore amoral, crass or despicable?
Well written, truthful and a reflection of americans today.
It’s so weird, living at the center of the Empire. I can’t stop wondering, what these Senators say if the government of China were organizing an active program for regime change in the US? I think they would just be flabbergasted; it simply doesn’t occur to them that such a thing could happen. They seem to lack self-awareness, which most would consider an essential aspect of consciousness.
“…and Iran is an awful regime”? Has anyone taken a serious look at Trump’s regime? Talk about awful. Sadly both the Republicans and the Democrats have proven not only to be ‘awful’ but absolutely dangerous to human lives in the Middle East, and around the world. America has proven to be a god awful evil empire. I can only blame the American people for what their government has become – though it has always been that way since its inception. It just got worse.
The US rogue regime wants to bomb Iran and remove its government. However, you must still believe in the fairy tale of US democracy. The people in the US have no choice, there is no meaningful choice. As Catilin points out: both both so called parties are right wing warmongers. And the US people have been subjected to the most pervasive, comprehensive and sophisticated system of misinformation and psychological conditioning in world history. The US people are also victims, and those who protest get shot in the face at point blank range.
We only attack shithole countries
And we are #1 hoping to be #2 .
Who is next ?
Stepping back from the BS, why is Iran an enemy, a threat to America ? It plainly isn’t.
All this propaganda doesn’t hide the fact that this is all about Israel having a hegemonic role in the ME. How much is this latest zionist initiated episode going to cost the american tax payer ? Tens, hundreds of billions ?
This madness defies logic. Let’s hope Iran is able to defend itself and inflict suitable punishment on Israel and the USA.
“Kinetic action” = dead civilians.
These people are pure evil.
All military actions are kinetic. The word adds nothing to any sentence that refers to flying airplanes and dropping bombs. It lends a pseudo-intellectual gloss to the statements of narcissistic sadists. So, yes, when sadistic bimbos like Hegseth and his sycophants use the term “kinetic action,” it is obviously a euphemism for “killing spree.”
What the “advisor” really said is “I think there is 90 percent chance we see a killing spree in the next few weeks.”
The level of sociopathic mental illness involves wealthy people taking the lives of millions of innocent unarmed poor people in order for them to secure having a even more comfortable life than they’ve already had. It is truly a sickness and they must be removed from their positions of wealth and power enabling them to perpetuate these war crimes against humanity.