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The request, which the White House has not submitted to Congress, is already encountering some resistance.
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In a major escalation in the war in the Middle East, Israel has bombed Iran's South Pars gas field, the largest known natural gas reserve in the world, leading Iran to attack energy sites across the Gulf. Iranian American professor of international affairs Vali Nasr says that Iran is prepared for a much longer war than the U.S. and Israel anticipated. "The longer this war goes on, the more Iran is building leverage, and the more the strategic calculations of Israel and the United States appear to be falling short," he says. Iran "thinks the longer that the war goes on, the less Israel and the United States will be able to defend against Iranian missiles, because they're going to run out of interceptors."
In the latest sign the war on Iran could be just beginning, Reuters is reporting President Trump is considering deploying thousands of more U.S. troops to the Middle East. The Pentagon has also asked for $200 billion from Congress.
The Iranian president has proposed terms for the end of the war including reparations and guarantees against future war. Nasr suggests that the Iranians are "confident" that some of their terms may be met. "President Trump may have to accept the fact that he has started a war that is not going to give him what he expected, and he has to settle for an exit in order to be able to go back to the agenda that it had before."
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A warrantless wiretapping law known as Section 702 is set to expire on April 20 unless Congress votes to extend it. Past cycles have been rocky.
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Democrats on the House Oversight Committee walked out of a closed-door briefing on the Epstein files with Attorney General Pam Bondi and her deputy, Todd Blanche, less than an hour after it began Wednesday, after Bondi repeatedly declined to say whether she would comply with a subpoena requiring her to appear for a sworn deposition on April 14. Democratic Congressmember Ro Khanna, who attended the briefing, said Bondi will have to answer "why there are still 3 million documents being hidden" and "why there was a cover-up of those files that implicated Donald Trump."
Khanna also comments on the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, noting that Trump's military actions are "a total betrayal of his promise that he was going to focus on American needs."
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For the second time since the war began, Senate Democrats tried and failed to win passage of a resolution that would have halted the offensive until President Trump went to Congress for approval.
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A day of strikes on energy facilities and testimony in Washington to members of Congress.
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A restrictive voter I.D. bill under consideration in the Senate could severely limit mail-in voting. Conservatives are pressing to end the practice outright, taking aim at an option that is widely used by voters.
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