DTDumpTrumpVerified facts, not vibes.
Browse Stories by issueTimeline Trump & familyElon Musk United StatesGlobal Military & warUkraine & Putin Fact checks: the big liesPeople & organizationsCountries More Memes & cardsProtest musicVoices & videosSources How we label evidenceCorrections AboutSend a tip, a meme or join the list
The record
Section · 12 sourced stories

Wars without Congress: Iran, Venezuela, the boat strikes and troops on American streets

A war of choice launched two days before a deal was 'within reach.' A head of state seized without telling Congress. Over 200 people killed at sea without a trial. Soldiers riding along on ICE raids.

Read the storiesThe memesTimeline
$43.6Bcost of the Iran war through Sept. 3, 202621US service members killed in the Iran war210+killed in boat strikes with no charges or trial0votes in Congress authorizing any of it

Why this section exists

The Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to take the country to war, and a law passed in 1878 keeps the army out of domestic policing. Between September 2025 and October 2026 the administration ignored both. It blew up small boats at sea and called the dead "unlawful combatants." It seized a foreign head of state and told Congress afterward. It launched a full-scale war on Iran two days before a negotiated deal, against decades of warnings about exactly how it would go, and then declared victory while the Strait of Hormuz stayed closed and gasoline passed $4. It sent federalized Guard troops and Marines into American cities until the Supreme Court and the Ninth Circuit stopped it.

What it cost

The numbers in this section are drawn from the Congressional Budget Office, Central Command, the Pentagon's own casualty system, the Costs of War project and the Energy Information Administration. Where a figure is an estimate, the story says so. Where the administration has refused to provide figures to Congress, the story says that too.

How to read the stories below

They run from the first boat strike to the most recent court ruling. Each includes the administration's legal and political justifications in its own words, and what remains uncertain. The memes are kept separate from the evidence.

The stories

Oldest event first · every claim sourced

Timeline

What the evidence labels mean →
  1. Background Congress passes the War Powers Resolution over Nixon's veto: notify Congress within 48 hours, withdraw within 60 days without authorization.
  2. Background A bipartisan group of former senior officials publishes 'Weighing Benefits and Costs of Military Action Against Iran': strikes buy up to four years, invite retaliation at Hormuz, do not produce regime change.
  3. A 2012 bipartisan study: strikes buy four years at most, Iran retaliates at Hormuz, no regime change. All three happened.
  4. 5,000 US troops ordered out of Germany after the chancellor criticized the Iran war
  5. Troops rode along on 75% of ICE operations in Los Angeles. A federal judge called it a national police force in the making.
  6. Background Operation Midnight Hammer strikes Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. Trump says Iran's program is 'obliterated'; a preliminary DIA assessment says months.
  7. The first boat strike left two survivors clinging to the wreck. A second strike killed them.
  8. Russia oil sanctions: waived three times during the Iran war, Hungary exempted for a year, Lukoil's $22B sale still open
  9. Congress was told about the raid on Caracas after it was over. About 75 people were dead.
  10. Two days before the bombs fell, Oman's foreign minister said an Iran deal was 'within reach'
  11. Iran war: $45.1 billion reported; $87.6 billion supplemental; $1.5 trillion 2027 request
  12. Three House votes to end the Iran war. One Senate vote, reversed the next day after Trump berated senators.
  13. He promised gas under $2. The Iran war took it to $4.48 and diesel to $6.50.
  14. Partisan estimate: Trump's oil stocks gained up to $15.5 million in 2026; $7 billion in pre-announcement oil bets under CFTC probe
  15. Signed the Russia sanctions law Sept. 18; waived it Oct. 16, two days before it took effect

Memes on this topic

All memes →

Memes are opinion and humor. They are kept separate from the sourced stories above and are never cited as evidence.

Primary documents