LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Lawmakers are reacting along party lines after the Trump administration briefed them on the U.S. and Israeli war against Iran.
A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
Here's the House Speaker Mike Johnson.
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MIKE JOHNSON: They gave us operational details. They gave us the rationale for what was done. And I was very satisfied with the briefing.
MARTÍNEZ: And here's Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
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CHUCK SCHUMER: That briefing raised many more questions than it answered.
MARTÍNEZ: Now, this comes as both chambers are expected to vote on measures to limit the president's ability to intervene further without congressional approval.
FADEL: Here to talk through this is NPR congressional correspondent Barbara Sprunt. Hey, Barbara.
BARBARA SPRUNT, BYLINE: Hey Leila.
FADEL: OK, so let's start with the briefing. What did we learn?
SPRUNT: Well, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters the reason for the attacks was what he called an imminent threat to the United States.
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MARCO RUBIO: We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action. We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces. And we knew that if we didn't preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.
FADEL: Now, we just heard from Senator Schumer that the briefing raised more questions than answers for him. What else are Democrats saying?
SPRUNT: Well, one thing that really stood out to me was hearing from Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on Senate intelligence after the briefing. He came out and he said that he thinks the administration has kept shifting the reason as to why this happened now.
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MARK WARNER: A week ago, it was about the Iranian nuclear capacity. A few days later, it was about taking out the ballistic missiles. It was then about regime change, and now we hear it's about sinking the Iranian fleet.
SPRUNT: Warner and other Democrats have made a point of acknowledging the human rights abuses and nuclear ambitions of the Iranian regime but say the administration hasn't given sufficient justification for this military action or explained what their plan is going forward.
FADEL: Now, the Constitution, that gives Congress the power to declare war. But in practice, presidents increasingly have very minimally consulted Congress on military operations. How is that dynamic playing out this week?
SPRUNT: Yeah, I mean, this is a bigger theme of the ceding of ground from the legislative branch to the executive branch. And although President Trump is ramping that up, it's certainly not new. And this week, the House and Senate are expected to vote on measures to require congressional approval for more military operations in Iran. And it may feel a little like deja vu because back in January, there was a separate war powers resolution to pull back intervention in Venezuela. That failed.
The resolution this week faces similar challenges. We expect the votes will largely fall along partisan lines, despite broad disapproval from Americans more generally about this war. But there are some outliers here on the hill, a small number of Republicans who say they'll vote to curb the president's actions and some Democrats who say that the resolution could actually restrict the flexibility that's needed to respond to threats in real time.
FADEL: And this is all happening as the Department of Homeland Security is still shut down. What's the latest there?
SPRUNT: Well, negotiations are slow. Not much progress seems to have been made since there was this shutdown in mid-February. We'll hear from DHS Secretary Kristi Noem today and tomorrow on the hill. Some Republicans are actually tying this to Iran. They say that, you know, because counterterrorism falls under the broad mandate of DHS, Congress should fund the department as soon as possible. But I haven't seen any movement from Democrats indicating that that is forthcoming. They are still pushing for changes to immigration enforcement.
FADEL: That's NPR's Barbara Sprunt. Thank you, Barbara.
SPRUNT: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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