President Donald Trump’s threats to wipe out Iran, "a whole civilisation," ended the restraint that Democrats have largely exercised when it comes to discussions about removing him from office in his second term.
By the dozens, Democrats said Trump should no longer serve in the White House, either through the impeachment process or the 25th Amendment, which allows the vice president and the Cabinet to declare that a president is no longer able to perform the job.
While Trump later pulled back on his threat and agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran , the episode highlighted growing demands for Democrats to oppose the Republican president in the strongest possible terms. Calls about Iran flooded into congressional offices, lawmakers said.
The breadth of the Democratic pushback underscored the gravity of Trump’s apocalyptic threat to a country of more than 91 million people. It also raised the domestic political stakes for a conflict that is far from over. The Trump administration faces mounting calls to testify about the war and justify its requests for hundreds of billions of dollars in new military spending.
"A commander in chief who is truly in control would have never got into this colossal mess to begin with," said Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer at a news conference on Wednesday in New York.
In the near term, both Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries are shying away from impeachment, instead urging Republicans to join them in passing legislation that would require Trump to obtain congressional approval before carrying out further attacks on Iran. Any attempt to remove Trump from office is unlikely to succeed while Republicans control Congress.
House Democrats plan to use a brief session on Thursday to call for the swift passage of war powers legislation, but Republican leadership is expected to block the effort.
"We will continue to apply maximum pressure on Republicans to put patriotic duty over party loyalty and join Democrats in stopping the madness," Jeffries said in a letter to Democratic members on Wednesday.
At the White House, press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended Trump’s rhetoric as effective.
"I think it was a very, very strong threat from the president of the United States that led the Iranian regime to cave to their knees and ask for a ceasefire and agree to reopening the Strait of Hormuz," she said at a press briefing. Callers jam congressional phone lines As they press their case against Trump, Democrats are responding to concerns from their base and constituents. Congressional offices were inundated with phone calls and emails this week, largely from people alarmed by the president’s rhetoric.
In the House, the office of Representative Suzan DelBene, Democrat of Washington, received a "ton" of calls and emails on Monday and Tuesday, mostly about Iran but also about impeaching Trump or removing him via the 25th Amendment, said an aide who was not authorised to discuss internal matters and spoke on condition of anonymity.
When staff in her district office took a break on Tuesday, they returned to 75 voicemails about Iran an hour later, the aide said.
"My office phones have not stopped ringing," said Representative Maxine Dexter, Democrat of Oregon, at a press conference in Portland, urging colleagues to return to Washington immediately.
Dexter’s office received 257 calls on Tuesday, more than it had ever logged in a 24-hour period since her team began keeping records.
The groundswell appeared to be organic rather than part of an organised campaign to pressure lawmakers into action.
While outside groups have circulated discussion points, including legal details around invoking the 25th Amendment, there has been no coordinated effort to flood congressional offices with a unified message, said a Democratic strategist familiar with the situation who spoke on condition of anonymity.
It was simply the "horror" of Trump’s remarks, the strategist said, and the scale of his threats that appeared to have driven the mobilisation.
On the political right, several prominent figures, including former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, also suggested Trump should be removed from office via the 25th Amendment. Will Democrats pursue impeachment? Democrats impeached Trump twice during his first term, but he was acquitted both times. They have largely avoided such debates for the past 16 months, focusing instead on cost-of-living issues rather than opposing a president who narrowly won the popular vote.
That changed after Trump’s threat on Tuesday morning to wipe out "an entire civilisation".
"Whether by his Cabinet or Congress, the President must be removed from office. We are playing with the brink," said Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York on social media.
Calls for Trump’s removal continued even after he announced the ceasefire.
"Temporary ceasefire or not, Trump already committed an impeachable offence. Congress needs to get back to work and remove him from office before he does more damage to our country and the world," said Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, a veteran of the Iraq war.
Republicans hold the majority in the House and have already blocked two previous attempts to impeach Trump in his second term. They may have to do so again, as Representative John Larson of Connecticut has filed a resolution containing 13 articles of impeachment against Trump.
In June, 128 Democrats joined all Republicans in voting to table a resolution introduced by Representative Al Green of Texas to impeach Trump for abuse of power after he launched military strikes on Iran without seeking prior authorisation from Congress.
A second impeachment resolution from Green in December resulted in a 237–140 vote, but there were signs of shifting sentiment, with 47 Democrats voting "present" rather than opposing it outright. Jeffries and other leaders said the groundwork for impeachment had not been sufficiently prepared and chose to focus on economic issues.
It remains unclear how Jeffries will respond to renewed calls for impeachment. Democratic leaders are scheduled to hold a call on Friday with members of the House Judiciary Committee focusing on "Trump administration accountability and the 25th Amendment".
Some Democrats have also turned their attention to Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, saying he should also be removed from office. Hegseth has defended US actions against Iran, claiming that American and Israeli forces had achieved a "capital V military victory" and that Iran no longer posed a significant threat to US forces or the region.
Representative Yassamin Ansari, whose family fled Iran for the United States, was among those calling for Hegseth’s removal. She said she was "momentarily relieved" that civilians in Iran would not face widespread destruction.
"We need urgent action for the sake of our national security and the safety and security of the rest of the world," Ansari said.