Iran War. . . USA Up 2-0 in the First Period

[petros]

1 hour ago -Politics & Policy

Iran ceasefire fails to quash Dem calls for Trump's removal​

President Trump's announcement of a ceasefire with Iran on Tuesday did little to stem the growing tide of calls from congressional Democrats for his impeachment or removal via the 25th Amendment.

Why it matters: The Republican support needed for these efforts to succeed is highly unlikely to materialize, but Democrats are desperate to show their voters that they are doing everything they can to get Trump out of office.

• Reps. Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.) and Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) each sent letters to Vice President J.D. Vance and the Cabinet asking to remove Trump by invoking the 25th Amendment to the Constitution.
• Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) introduced articles of impeachment against Trump on Tuesday morning, which cite the war in Iran among many other alleged violations.
• Rep. Yassamin Ansari (D-Ariz.) also announced plans to file articles of impeachment against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for his role in the war.

The latest: Trump announced Tuesday night that he agreed to a two-week ceasefire just over an hour before his stated deadline for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

• Trump had threatened in a Tuesday morning post on Truth Social that if the deadline wasn't met, "a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. I don't want that to happen, but it probably will."
• That statement had Democrats and even a handful of Republicans up in arms, but Vance — despite his reputation as an anti-interventionist — backed up the president, saying, "We've got tools in our toolkit that we so far haven't decided to use."
• A spokesperson for Vance did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

By the numbers: More than 85 House Democrats had called for President Trump to be impeached or removed via the 25th Amendment as of Tuesday evening.

• Among those were members of House Democratic leadership and prominent lawmakers such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
• The vast majority were progressives, however, with more moderate and swing-district Democrats mostly sticking to calls for an Iran war powers vote.

What they're saying: Several House Democrats made clear their calls for Trump's removal still stand despite the ceasefire agreement.

• "Just because a President announces he's agreed to a two week ceasefire moments before he threatened to commit war crimes, does not mean he is suddenly fit to serve," Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-N.M.) said in a post on X.
• Said Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.): I'm glad there is a reported ceasefire deal with Iran. But ... Donald Trump can't simply threaten war crimes with impunity. Congress needs to get back in session now to stop this war and remove Donald Trump."

The bottom line: These efforts were extreme long-shots to begin with, and the ceasefire only further takes the steam out of them.

• But, to Republicans at least, they are a clear signal of where Democrats may go if they retake one or both chambers of Congress in November.
• "If the GOP doesn't hold the House, impeachment 3.0 is coming," former Republican congressman and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said in a post on X.

 

[pgs]

Sounds to me that whoever is in charge in Iran blinked first .

 

[Ron in Regina]

Sounds to me that whoever is in charge in Iran blinked first .

Or Trump looked at the polling numbers for the midterm election (that don’t matter to him) and took what he could. Both Trump and Iran are going to claim victory (Trump has been claiming victory since the beginning of March but this is still going on). We’ll have to see how flexible both (or either) side(s) are going to be in the next two weeks, & this allows time for the ground forces that apparently America will not not use to arrive in the region.
Even if Iran does fully open Hormuz – without conditioning passage on tolls or other payments – its ability to control the key geopolitical chokepoint is more clear now than ever. A president has been set.

In a statement after Trump's ceasefire message, Iranian foreign minister Seyed Aragchi said that Iran would halt its "defensive operations" and allow safe passage through the Hormuz "via coordination with Iran's armed forces" (meaning?). He added that the US had accepted the "general framework" of the Iranian 10-point plan.

That plan includes the US withdrawing its military forces from the region (meaning what? The Carrier Groups? Or from bases established in neighbouring countries for decades?), lifting economic sanctions on Iran, paying compensation for war damages and allowing Iran to maintain control over Hormuz. It is hard to imagine Trump actually agreeing to any of those conditions – a sign that the next two weeks of negotiations could be treacherous.

For the moment, however, this is a partial political victory for Trump. He made a dramatic threat and achieved the desired result. But the ceasefire is a reprieve, not a permanent settlement.

The long-term cost of the president's words and actions, and of the war overall, has yet to be fully assessed. The White House is likely to counter that the leverage worked, however.

Iran's military has been significantly degraded. Although its Islamic fundamentalist regime is still in power, many of its top leaders have been killed in bombing strikes, and American stockpiles of Patriot and other missiles have been significantly depleted, along with its reputation globally for those that where not anti-American before Trumps second term. Even if the two-week ceasefire does result in a permanent peace, the Iran war – and Trump's recent words – may have fundamentally altered the way the rest of the world views the US.

Iran ceasefire deal a partial win for Trump - but at a high cost — BBC News

The path to the two-week ceasefire with Iran may have fundamentally altered the way the rest of the world views the US.

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