Vance Says Iran War Cost Republicans the Senate — SkimNews
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- JD Vance wrote on X that “the reason we lost is the war,” and said anyone arguing the war was worthwhile must justify losing the Senate to Democrats for the next six years.
- JD Vance cited a pollster he trusts who found ending the Iran war and changing the U.S. relationship with Israel were two of the top four responses among people who voted for Trump in 2024 but planned to vote for Democrats in the 2026 midterms.
- Iran and Vance were searching for a way out of the conflict; Vance had been more dovish than other key administration members, and his post marked his closest public divergence from Trump.
- Trump said the electoral rebuke did not change his view of the war: “I did the right thing. I would have done it again,” he told the Wall Street Journal.
- Iran has been economically damaged along with the United States, while the conflict has pushed global fuel prices higher.
Why it matters: For Republicans, losing the Senate for six years makes the Iran war central to the midterm defeat. Vance publicly blames the conflict, while Trump insists the same launch was right and repeatable, leaving the party with two conflicting defenses of the war.
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