Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., talks with reporters outside the U.S. Capitol after President Donald Trump selected Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., to replace Kristi Noem as the Department of Homeland Security secretary on Thursday, March 5, 2026.
Tom Williams | CQ-Roll Call, Inc. | Getty Images
A group of Senate Democrats on Monday laid out a plan to potentially force a series of war powers votes unless Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio testify about the U.S. military activity in Iran.
"We're trying to force the Senate to do its job," Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., told reporters at a briefing on Monday. "We are going to use every lever that we have to stop business as usual and force the Senate to do what it should have done already."
Booker was joined by Sens. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., Tim Kaine, D-Va., Chris Murphy, D-Conn., and Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who are part of a group that introduced a series of war powers resolutions at the end of last week intended to block further military action in Iran without congressional approval.
It is an escalation by a group of Democrats hoping to check President Donald Trump, who they say requires congressional approval to continue the war. The Trump administration has not provided a sufficient explanation for the strikes, they argued.
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"A president can engage military action without coming to us for two reasons: defense from ongoing or imminent attack. Or Congress already passed an authorization," Kaine said.
In briefings, Kaine, said, "The administration has made no claim that any previous authorization gives them the power to wage this war. ... There was zero evidence of imminence."
The senators did not indicate when they would force a vote, but Booker said they were looking for "immediate action" in holding hearings with Hegseth and Rubio. Murphy called on Hegseth and Rubio to appear as soon as next week.
"We're not going to let the Senate go on with business as usual. We're not going to let the Senate be silenced until they make, at the very least, that commitment," Murphy said. "I don't think they can defend this war."
The Senate last week blocked a war powers resolution brought by Kaine and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on a vote of 47-53, just shy of the 50-vote threshold required to advance the measure. The House on Thursday voted against a similar measure, 212-219.
"We have filed our resolutions in order to get our Republican colleagues to acknowledge their duties as senators, to be a check and balance to this administration," Baldwin said. "Our Republican colleagues have abdicated their responsibilities."
