Rep. Sara Jacobs: A Leading Voice Against Trump’s Reckless War in Iran
Since President Trump launched a reckless and illegal regime-change operation in Iran, Rep. Sara Jacobs (CA-51) has been a leading voice in Congress, pushing for an end to this war, supporting a bipartisan war powers resolution, leading oversight of instances of civilian harm, and vowing to oppose the Pentagon’s floated $200 billion defense supplemental package.
In the immediate aftermath of the first U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran, Rep. Sara Jacobs told Kaitlan Collins at CNN: “I think this is one of, if not the biggest, blunders in American foreign policy.” She went on to say: “We’ve seen this before in Iraq and Afghanistan, and I’m very concerned that so far we have seen absolutely no plan for what comes next, absolutely no real strategy around this. We know that the U.S. actually is very bad at military adventurism in the Middle East. We’re very bad at regime change and at predicting what trying to regime change will lead to. And we don’t even have to look to other countries, right? It’s the U.S.’s own history of the CIA coup in Iran in the 50s that is in part what led to this very brutal Iranian regime today.”
She has also criticized President Trump for following the lead of PM Netanyahu, saying on MS Now: “Bibi Netanyahu has literally been trying to get presidents from both parties to do a regime change operation in Iran with him for decades. Donald Trump is just the first one stupid enough to actually do it.”
In a fiery speech on the House Floor, Rep. Sara Jacobs urged her colleagues to vote for the bipartisan war powers resolution to prohibit the Trump Administration’s further hostilities against Iran. She said: “While [our troops are] willing to make those sacrifices, we in Congress should be damn sure it’s worth it. Too often, it’s not…My colleagues will try to claim that voting for this war powers resolution hurts our service members. But the opposite is true…if any of my colleagues vote no [on the war powers resolution], they should come to my district, look our service members in the eye, and explain why they believe debating before we risk their lives is a bad thing.”
At a House Armed Services Committee hearing on March 5th, Rep. Sara Jacobs questioned Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby, who was unable to answer questions about whether or not the U.S. is at war, the objectives, or the total cost to the American people. In part, Rep. Jacobs said: “The American people are not stupid. Under Secretary Colby, this administration keeps telling us this is not Iraq, while using the exact same arguments that were used to justify the war in Iraq…And you literally can’t even tell me whether this is a war, what we’re trying to achieve, or how much it’s going to cost the American people. My generation has been paying our entire lives for forever wars that your president promised to end. And yet, you sit here today unable to provide us with any clarity. Our service members and the American people deserve better.”
As Founder and Co-Chair of the Protection of Civilians in Conflict caucus, Rep. Sara Jacobs, alongside Reps. Yassamin Ansari and Jason Crow, led a total of 121 House Democrats in demanding answers on civilian harm during Operation Epic Fury, including a reported U.S. strike on an Iranian girls’ elementary school, where at least 175 civilians, many of them children, were killed. She told NBC News that “we should all feel deeply ashamed by the killing of 175 civilians, mostly little children, who have nothing to do with this awful, reckless war…President Trump is denying any U.S. involvement in this strike and blaming Iran without any evidence and before the investigation is even complete.”
At a House Foreign Affairs Services Committee hearing on March 18th, Rep. Sara Jacobs questioned the State Department’s Under Secretary for Management Jason Evans about the failure to adequately inform, prepare, and evacuate Americans in the Middle East. In part, Rep. Jacobs said, “Why is it that we were unprepared to evacuate Americans on a crisis that we started and we were more prepared to evacuate Americans from Afghanistan in a crisis that we didn’t start?” In response, Evans said: “Uh I would not say we were not prepared.”
On CNN yesterday, Rep. Sara Jacobs vowed to vote against any defense supplemental package, including the floated $200 billion package. She said: “I will not be voting for any supplemental for this war for two reasons: one, I think that this war is wrong. It’s ill-advised, it’s illegal, and sending more money only allows them to escalate further. But also because we’ve seen in multiple court proceedings that it is viewed that if you fund a war, it is viewed as de facto Congress authorizing the war, and I do not think this war should be authorized…Not to mention the fact that $200 billion is the equivalent of the budget of the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development combined.”
Rep. Sara Jacobs ran for Congress to be a voice for her generation and San Diego, the country’s biggest military community, and to caution about the unintended consequences of forever wars. Through her roles on the House Foreign Affairs and House Armed Services Committees, she has worked to shift U.S. foreign policy away from a military-first approach to instead focus on conflict prevention and addressing the root causes, as well as reining in presidential war powers. Before Congress, she worked at the State Department, UNICEF, and the United Nations to address, minimize, and prevent conflict, instability, and inequality around the world.
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