President Donald Trump and his Department of Defense appear to have a strategy to get Congress to pay off his costly war with Iran, according to the hosts of Pod Save America, but it is a plan that could turn into the "worst possible scenario for Republicans" heading into the midterms.
During the Friday episode of Pod Save America, co-hosts and former Obama administration officials Jon Favreau and Dan Pfieffer touched on the state of Congress's response to Trump's war of choice against Iran, noting that one of the strongest plays Democrats can make will be to force their GOP colleagues vote to support the unpopular conflict as often as possible, a plan that is already brewing.
Favreau, the former White House director of speechwriting, further noted that the administration appears to have quieted down about its request for $200 billion in supplemental funding for the war, which many observers said would inevitably be interpreted as a proxy for Congress's support of the war overall. Pfieffer — who served as Barack Obama's communications director and senior adviser — added that the White House cannot avoid going to Congress for money indefinitely.
"I don't see that legislation getting fast-tracked anytime soon," Favreau said.
"I just don't know what the immediate urgency is," Pfieffer added. "When the Pentagon wants something, the Pentagon is very, very good at ensuring that everyone knows they want it...Trump and Russ Vought have made a mockery of all budgeting laws, so they can be robbing from all sorts of places to avoid this, but at some point, they're gonna need that money, and they're gonna have to go to Congress for it... Then that becomes the most important, most politically salient vote people will take on this war."
Favreau argued further that the Trump administration could be stalling the request for supplemental funding on purpose now. Given that Trump is attempting, with little success, to negotiate an end to the conflict, they might be waiting until there is no longer an active war, so that they can then ask for the money to cover its cost by requesting funds to refill the military's dwindling munitions supply.
He also cited a recent Wall Street Journal piece, which found that the Iran conflict has left the U.S. military's stockpile so low that it would be unable to effectively wage the long-predicted future war with China.
Pfieffer concurred that this strategy was plausible, but also floated a major "risk" it poses with the midterm election on the horizon, which the GOP is already expected to lose badly.
"The risk to that strategy is, the later you wait, the closer you put it to the election," Pfieffer explained. "We're at late April now... The worst possible scenario for Republicans is they have to deal with this in September, right before the election."
"As gas prices are already over $5 a gallon at that point," Favreau added.