SUNDAY DEBRIEF: JULY 26-AUG 2

The Senate had a chance to vote on whether the president needs congressional authorization to wage war against Iran. The vote was 50 to 49. It failed because one Democrat, John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, voted with the Republican majority. The same John Fetterman who met face to face with Netenyahu during his visit to the Whitehouse this week.

That was Thursday. On Wednesday night, a U.S. strike killed a two-year-old named Sina Jafari and his parents in a village of street sweepers on Qeshm Island, in the Strait of Hormuz. On Friday, Exxon, Chevron, and Shell reported combined quarterly profits of $36.3 billion, driven by the war that Congress just declined to authorize. Oil is at $90 on a pause day and $98 on a strike day. Eight thousand sailors are trapped in the strait on 600 ships with no way out.

On Saturday, the president posted that he was calling off the next strike and that the parameters of a deal were in place. Iran denied any deal exists. He has done this before and I call it market manipulation.

That same week, Anthony Fauci invoked the Fifth Amendment more than 100 times at a Senate hearing. Trump threatened to withdraw his attorney general nominee rather than let him answer questions about Epstein survivors. The Senate unanimously voted to oppose pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell. Trump asked the Supreme Court to erase the $83.3 million E. Jean Carroll verdict. Truth API launched, and Wall Street can now pay $100,000 a month to see the president’s posts before everyone else.

Congress left for recess.

It was one of the busier weeks we have had. A lot to cover, so let’s go!

U.S. Central Command launched strikes against Iran every night for 12 consecutive nights through July 23, and the target list continued to include civilian infrastructure under the dual-use doctrine reported last issue: if the military has ever used a piece of infrastructure, it qualifies as a target. Bridges, power plants, and water systems remained on the list while the civilian harm prevention office remains at fewer than 40 employees, down from 200.

On July 26-27, the fighting paused. The White House said it was giving peace talks “some space,” but Iran’s Foreign Ministry said there are no talks with the U.S. and that Tehran “will never allow the United States to determine the timing of war and peace.” Iran broke the pause on July 28 with missile and drone strikes on U.S. positions in Kuwait and Jordan, and the U.S. resumed strikes.

On July 30, U.S. overnight strikes hit Qeshm Island and destroyed the Jafari family’s home in Chah Tangu. Qaisar, Zahra, and two-year-old Sina were killed, and their other two children survived. The same night, a drone struck the Mediterranean port of Damietta in Egypt, setting fire to a U.S.-owned storage vessel and a Greek tanker. It was the first time Egypt had been hit. Iran denied involvement and called it a possible false flag, and Egypt, the one Arab state that had stayed out of the war, is now in it.

On Tuesday, July 28, Trump hosted Netanyahu at the White House. Before the meeting, he told Fox News: “Bibi is telling me [about Iran’s nuclear rebuilding] because he wants me to stay involved.” The meeting lasted 90 minutes, and Netanyahu called it “one of the best we’ve ever had.” Zelenskyy met Trump separately, and both attended Lindsey Graham’s funeral.

On Saturday, Trump posted that he was canceling a planned strike because the “parameters” of a deal had been reached, including the immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and an end to Iran’s nuclear threat. Iran denied any agreement exists, and Trump has announced halts to strikes multiple times since February. Each time, fighting has resumed.

The total since February: at least 14 U.S. service members killed and over 400 wounded. Iran claims more than 3,000 of its people killed, including 254 children. On July 22, Trump attended the dignified transfer at Dover Air Force Base for four flag-draped caskets: Tyler James Feehan, 25, of Hawaii; Isabella Gonzales, 19, of Texas; Angel S. Rampersad, 28, of Queens; and Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, of North Carolina. It was Trump’s third dignified transfer since the war started.

Fewer than 10 commercial ships per day are now transiting the Strait of Hormuz, down from roughly 130 before the war. About 600 vessels remain trapped in the Persian Gulf, 8,000 sailors are stranded on those ships, and 14 commercial mariners are dead. Nine ships with 93 crew members have been abandoned at anchor by their owners, the crews left without food, wages, or a way home. The U.S. Navy fired on at least two merchant vessels that attempted to breach the blockade.

On July 20, Yemen’s Houthis declared a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia and struck two Saudi oil tankers in the Red Sea, opening a second chokepoint alongside Hormuz. Saudi Arabia responded by forming a 14-nation military alliance to protect Red Sea shipping. Brent crude hit $98.49 on July 23, making July crude oil’s strongest month since March at 24 percent, and the price has swung between $85 and $98 over the past 10 days depending on whether the U.S. and Iran are bombing each other that particular night.

My read: Sina Jafari was two years old. His village is populated by street sweepers and day laborers. CENTCOM classified the strike that killed him as part of an operation against IRGC command centers. The civilian harm prevention office that would have flagged the risk of hitting a residential village has been gutted, and the dual-use doctrine the Pentagon is using to justify strikes on civilian infrastructure has no meaningful check on it anymore. The president is announcing and canceling strikes in the same week while 130 ships a day have been reduced to fewer than 10, 8,000 sailors are trapped, and the Navy is disabling merchant ships with Hellfire missiles for trying to pass through. On Thursday, the Senate had a chance to assert its constitutional authority over this war, and one Democrat killed the vote. On Friday, Exxon, Chevron, and Shell reported $36.3 billion in combined quarterly profits from the oil prices this war created. I’ve said this from the start: we will end up worse than when we went in because there were never clear objectives for what success looked like. We have killed hundreds of innocent children and civilians and are continuing to destroy civilian infrastructure. We have lost our way with no real way out. But that is what happens when you go into a country as large as Iran because Israel wanted you to and all the while with no strategic objectives of what success looks like on the other end.

On Thursday, July 30, the Senate voted 50 to 49 to defeat a war powers resolution that would have required the president to withdraw U.S. forces from hostilities against Iran unless Congress specifically authorized the war. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York introduced the measure, and three Republicans crossed over to support it: Rand Paul of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

John Fetterman of Pennsylvania was the only Democrat to vote against the resolution. Without his vote, it would have passed 50-49 the other direction. Fetterman has broken with Democrats on foreign policy repeatedly since taking office, voting with Republicans on Israel-related measures and now on Iran war authorization.

The vote marks the second time in two weeks the Senate has rejected a war powers resolution on Iran. The House passed its own version in June, but it carried no binding force. Congress left for a five-week recess without authorizing the war, and the president continues to conduct strikes under the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, which was written to target al-Qaeda after September 11.

My read: The Constitution gives Congress the power to declare war, and Congress has not declared this one. The Senate had a chance to force the question, and it came down to one vote from one Democrat. Three Republicans voted to limit the president’s war powers, and one Democrat voted to let the war continue without authorization. The 2001 AUMF was written to go after the people who attacked us on September 11, and it is now being used to bomb bridges in Iran and kill two-year-olds on islands in the Strait of Hormuz. The Senate could have said that is not what the authorization was for. Forty-nine senators did. Fifty said nothing needs to change and one of those, Fetterman, sat with Netanyahu during his visit this week. America first?

On Friday, July 31, the three largest Western oil companies reported their second-quarter earnings. ExxonMobil made $14.5 billion, more than double a year ago and its highest haul since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022. Chevron posted $12.1 billion, more than quadrupling last year’s figure and the largest quarterly profit in the company’s 145-year history. Shell earned $9.8 billion, more than double the year before and its second-highest quarter on record.

Combined, the three companies earned roughly $404 million per day for three months, driven by war-inflated crude prices that have kept Brent above $85 since May. The earnings were reported the same day Americans were paying over $4 a gallon at the pump, and one day after the Senate voted not to require congressional authorization for the war that is driving those prices.

My read: The math is simple. The war closed the strait, the strait closure spiked oil, and the oil spike made Chevron more money in one quarter than it has ever made in its 145-year history. Every gallon of gas sold in America right now carries a war premium, and the war has no congressional authorization, no defined objectives, and no exit strategy. The companies reporting record profits are the same companies whose executives have been meeting with the White House on energy policy since January. Follow the money on this one…