Several members of Philadelphia’s Congressional delegation responded over the weekend to President Donald Trump’s decision to launch air strikes in Iran.
The attack, amid ongoing hostilities between Iran and Israel, targeted three nuclear sites and was designed to prevent the Islamic republic from developing an atomic weapon, administration officials said.
Among lawmakers in Washington, D.C., the reaction was mixed and not completely along party lines.
Pennsylvania’s U.S. senators praised the strikes, with Sen. John Fetterman, a Democratic and staunch supporter of Israel who has increasingly sided against his caucus, characterized the bombing mission as “the correct move.”
“Iran is the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism and cannot have nuclear capabilities,” Fetterman wrote on X, previously known as Twitter.
“This targeted attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities is the result of the Iranian regime’s failure to make a deal despite months of President Trump’s good faith efforts to negotiate,” GOP Sen. Dave McCormick said in a statement.
“I applaud President Trump’s strong leadership and his continued commitment to peace through strength,” McCormick continued. “Once again, America’s detractors around the world should know President Trump means what he says.”
Democratic U.S. Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon, echoing House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, demanded the administration brief lawmakers on the attack. Her district covers parts of South and Southwest Philadelphia, in addition to sections of Delaware, Chester and Montgomery counties.
“Donald Trump’s decision to bomb Iran without seeking Congressional authorization is unacceptable, both because the decision to wage war rests with Congress, and because there has been no evidence of any imminent threat to the United States,” Scanlon said in a statement.
“By abandoning diplomacy and launching this attack, Donald Trump and his cabinet have placed our service members, the American people, and innocent civilians in the region at serious risk with no clear guarantee that these actions will prevent Iran from gaining nuclear weapons,” she added.
Rep. Dwight Evans, a Democrat representing Philadelphia, reposted Jefferies’s response, which states, in part, that Trump has failed on a promise to bring peace to the Middle East and that “the risk of war has now dramatically increased.”
