Republicans Try to Distance Themselves From Iran War While Keeping It Going

“The war needs to come to an end as quickly as possible so that we can lower gas prices,” Senator Jon Husted (R-Ohio) told Politico last Tuesday.

Two days later, he voted against a resolution directing “the President to remove the use of United States Armed Forces from hostilities against the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

Unpopularity Contest

Husted, who was appointed to Vice President JD Vance’s former Senate seat last year and now seeks to retain it via a special election, isn’t alone in his apparent hypocrisy. Several Republican candidates in tight races have recently expressed a desire to wind down the war but have similarly balked at doing anything to stop it.

These candidates have good reason to distance themselves from President Donald Trump’s unconstitutional don’t-call-it-a-war. Despite the GOP’s attempts at convincing people that things aren’t really as bad as they seem, everyone can see the price at the gas pump, and everyone knows it’s a direct result of the war.

While the public has never really backed the war, a recent CNN/SSRS poll found that “broad majorities say the conflict has hurt US interests, has not been worth the costs and that the president lacks a clear plan to handle it.” Furthermore, “much of the decline in approval of [Trump’s] handling of Iran comes among Republicans.” As Husted himself put it, “I don’t know anybody that doesn’t want the war to come to an end.”

Trick or Defeat

The hostilities in the Middle East are especially endangering Republicans in America’s Middle West, where high fuel prices are taking their toll. Still, these same candidates do know of one person — make that two — who is in no hurry to conclude the war, and they fear becoming the next Congressman Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), driven from office by Trump and the Israel lobby.

Thus, observed the American Conservative’s Luke Nicastro, the Republican Party’s

overwhelming approach has been to try to trick voters into thinking vulnerable GOP candidates are somehow “breaking” with the administration on Iran. To vaguely say the war is bad while studiously avoiding even the appearance of action — lest the White House take notice — and hope that voters don’t think too hard about what it is legislators are supposed to do.

And so, noted Nicastro, we have the spectacle of Husted — who is now behind in the polls by roughly the same margin by which Vance won the seat four years ago — saying “it is imperative for the war to end” while remaining “resolutely opposed to any measures to effect its conclusion.”

Hinson Allegations

The war is so unpopular in Iowa that two of its Republican representatives, Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Zach Nunn, actually voted a fortnight ago in favor of a resolution demanding an end to the war.

Congresswoman Ashley Hinson (R-Iowa), on the other hand, was a “nay” on the resolution. Yet Hinson, who is now running for Senate, posted on social media last Monday:

Iowans are being squeezed and shouldn’t have to foot the bill at the pump or the checkout line for the war in Iran. We need to use every option at our disposal to provide some relief from high prices.

“The war,” she declared, “needs to be brought to a successful and immediate end.”

X users, at least, weren’t fooled. To Hinson’s post, they added links to four opportunities the lawmaker had to vote on resolutions calling for an immediate end to the war. Every single time, she came down on the side of continuing it.

Great Fakes

Things aren’t much different in Michigan. Representative John James, who is trailing badly in the polls to be the next governor, said last Tuesday, “We need to use every resource at our disposal to bring this war to an end quickly.” Democrats were quick to point out that James had voted against six anti-Iran-war resolutions.

That same day, former Wolverine State GOP Congressman Mike Rogers, who is currently running for Senate, posted a social-media video stating flatly, “The war with Iran needs to end, and end quickly.” Rogers may not have had an opportunity to vote on any war-powers resolutions, but his public statements on the subject cast serious doubt on the sincerity of his desire to conclude it, reported the Daily Caller:

Rogers previously described Iran as an “imminent threat” and called U.S. military action a “win-win-win” for the nation. He stated he did not mind giving Trump continued authority over military action while negotiations continued.

Thus, wrote Nicastro, Rogers’ brief video remark “amounted only to the expression of a vague wish; it was no more a call to action than my hoping aloud it won’t rain this weekend and spoil my camping trip.”

In neighboring Wisconsin, GOP Representative Tom Tiffany, who is seeking the governorship, said last week, “I just believe that we should be exiting Iran, that it’s time to move on, we’ve degraded their nuclear facilities, we’ve degraded their military, most of their ships are in the bottom of the ocean. Time to come home [and] take care of business here in America.”

Nevertheless, Tiffany — who, unlike all the other politicians mentioned above, has an excellent score on The New American’s Freedom Index — still voted against multiple war-powers resolutions.

These Republicans have just five weeks to prove they’re not all talk and no action. Every day the war drags on, more voters will be convinced they’re hypocrites who deserve to be shown the door.