Leader Schumer Floor Remarks Rebuking Trump’s Characterization Of The Iran War, Announcing His Opposition To The NDAA, And Demanding An Immediate End To This Illegal War

Washington, D.C. - Today, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) spoke on the Senate floor criticizing Trump for comparing the Iran war to the Vietnam War and announcing his intent to vote against the NDAA to avoid giving the president a blank check for his unauthorized, unpopular war. Below are Senator Schumer's remarks, which can also be viewed here:

When all that Trump can say about his disastrous war with Iran is that Vietnam was worse - a point Trump made yesterday - he reveals the scale of his failure. That's what Donald Trump said. The only thing he can say is Vietnam was worse. Oh my god. A war that killed close to 50,000 Americans, a war that lasted almost a decade. A war that ripped America apart in ways that took decades to recover. That's what he compared Iran to? Oh my god.

Trump's supposed ceasefire deal has completely collapsed, our troops are coming under attack, the Strait of Hormuz is a minefield, and gas prices are going back up.

And Donald Trump is totally out of his depth - in fact Donald Trump's drowning in the Strait of Hormuz because he has no plan.

He had no plan when he got America into this war, and he has no plan on how to get us out.

Trump started this war without authorization, without a strategy, and without an exit. The reason that we have a War Powers Act is to force the administration to think though the consequences of going to war ahead of time. Trump of course didn't listen until finally after weeks, bipartisan majorities in both chambers of Congress voted to end it. We had tried and tried; finally enough Republicans joined us but Donald Trump, he ignored them.

So, now the White House has formally notified Congress that hostilities have resumed, and American strikes are underway again, and our forces remain positioned for more.

Yet Republicans want the Senate to take up the NDAA, the defense bill, as though none of this is happening-as though Congress can debate the nation's central national security bill while ignoring the nation's most urgent national security crisis.

We cannot.

I will be voting no.

The President is waging an unauthorized war, defying bipartisan majorities in Congress, refusing to level with the American people about the cost, the mission, or the endgame.

The NDAA cannot become a permission slip for that recklessness that we see occurring in Iran.

Donald Trump does not get to drag the American people deeper into a war he cannot explain and does not know how to end-and then demand that Congress look the other way.

Donald Trump and the administration have no authorization. No strategy. No peace. No blank check.

Therefore, a day after the President told Congress that his war is back on, I am a no, a strong no on NDAA.

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