The reaction is increasing after the United States and Israel announced a major military campaign against Iran early Saturday, following weeks of threats from President Trump.
Mr. Trump announce the call, called “Operation Epic Fury,” in a Truth Social video. He called on the Iranian military to lay down their weapons and for the citizens of Iran to rise up and “take over your government.” Mr. Trump told the Washington Post that he wants to protect the freedom and security of the people of Iran.
Sen. Roger Wicker, Republican of Mississippi and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, called the action “an important and necessary operation to protect the American people and American interests” and said that “the Iranian regime has never been weaker.”
Trump supporter Sen. Lindsey Graham said the operation was “well planned” and would be “violent, extensive and I believe, at the end of the day, successful.”
“My mind is racing with the thought that the murderous ayatollah regime in Iran will soon be gone. The biggest change in the Middle East in a thousand years is upon us,” said Graham, a Republican representing South Carolina, on social media. He prayed for anyone involved in the project, saying the effort would make “America safer and ultimately more prosperous.”
Sen. Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas and chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, shared a list of crimes committed by Iran and said that “the butcher’s bill finally came because of the ayatollahs.”
Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, a Democrat and the vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, called the military action “a very important decision that risks dragging America into another wider war in the Middle East.”
He criticized the Iranian regime for supporting terrorism and undermining regional stability, but said, “acknowledging those facts does not absolve any president of the responsibility to act in accordance with the law, with a clear strategy, and with Congress.”
“The American people have seen this playbook before — claims of urgency, misguided intelligence, and military action that drags the United States into regime change and long-term, costly nation-building. We owe it to our service members, and to the entire American family, to make sure we don’t repeat the mistakes of the past,” Warner said. “The president owes the country clear answers: What is the goal? What is the strategy to prevent proliferation? And how does this make the American people safer?”
Sen. Ruben Gallego, a Democrat from Arizona and an Iraq War veteran, criticized the operation.
“I lost friends in Iraq because of the illegal war,” Gallego said on social media. “Young working children should not have to pay the full price for regime change and a war that the American people have not defined or approved. We can support the democratic movement and the people of Iran without sending our soldiers to die.”
Rep. Thomas Massie, a frequent critic of Mr Trump, appeared to describe the operation as “acts of war not authorized by Congress” on social media. In June 2025,
Massie introduced a resolution directing the president to “restrain the use of the United States Armed Forces in the war against Iran” without action by Congress. Democrats were planning to force a vote on the war powers resolution introduced by Massie and Rep. Ro Khanna.
Khanna said on Saturday morning that Congress “must meet on Monday” to vote on a resolution to “stop this” and asked members of Congress to share their plans for the weekend vote.
“Donald Trump has launched a war on Iran. Congress must reconvene on Monday to vote on Thomas Massie’s resolution and my war resolution to stop this war. Trump says his goal is to overthrow the Iranian regime,” Khanna said in the video. “But the American people are tired of regime change, wars that have cost us billions of dollars and put our lives at risk. We don’t want to fight a country of 90 million people in the Middle East.”
Rep. Nancy Mace supported the president’s action, writing on social media: “President Trump understood what the weak could not say: that peace is not found in silence – it is won. The Iranian people have fought for their freedom. Their cries did not fall on deaf ears. Not on Trump’s watch.”
