Trump never had a plan for this war. Congress must make one. | Opinion

President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attempted to avoid accountability at the end of April by absurdly asserting that they had pressed pause on the war with Iran. They've likely been breaking the law ever since.

But their rationale – if you can bear to call it that – just fell apart.

The War Powers Resolution, federal legislation adopted in 1973, requires a president to cease hostilities after 60 days of fighting or receive congressional approval to continue. That deadline arrived May 1.

But Trump and Hegseth claimed that a shaky ceasefire with Iran that started in April had stopped the clock from ticking on the 60-day deadline.

That was nonsense. There is no pause button in the War Powers Resolution.

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And then the U.S. military reported sinking at least six Iranian boats on May 4 while they were targeting commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.

So Trump's pretend pause is no more.

Trump doesn't seem too worried about following the law on war

Trump, our first felon president, won't care about breaking another law. He flat-out called the War Powers Resolution "totally unconstitutional" on the 60th day of his war, when asked about the deadline.

And Hegseth won't follow the law. He's been rooting for Americans to commit war crimes since this started.

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Don't look to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to urge Trump to follow the law. Blanche, who led Trump's defense team in the criminal casethat resulted in Trump's felony convictions, tried to play the war-has-a-pause-button game on NBC News' "Meet The Press" on May 3.

"My job as the acting attorney general is to make sure that the president, that we all are doing the right thing legally," Blanche said. "And we absolutely are." 

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It's a prerequisite for a job in Trump's second-term Cabinet to be able to say stuff like that with a straight face, especially if you're still trying out for a permanent appointment, like Blanche is these days.

The Republicans overseeing their party's majority control in the House and Senate have shown little interest in serving as an equal branch of the American government, choosing instead to serve as servants to Trump's scattershot agenda.

But this war is a disaster in every direction. A serious majority of Americans oppose it. And they dislike the economic impact Trump's war has had on the price of gas and other everyday expenses.

And – oh, hey – here comes November's midterm elections, with Democrats seeking control of the House and Senate.

If only out of a sense of political survival, Republicans in the House and Senate must hold Trump accountable for Iran. They have federal law on their side, even if he doesn't care about the law.

That's the way this is supposed to work. There is a natural tension built into our federal government. The executive, legislative and judicial branches should serve as checks and balances.

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What are the odds that Republicans in Congress will use their authority?

Just look at how we got the War Powers Resolution. It passed in the House in 1973 by a vote of 284-135 and in the Senate by 75-18. So clearly it had strong support.

But Richard Nixon, who was president at the time, didn't want his powers restricted by Congress, so he vetoed the legislation. Nixon asserted that legislation was "unconstitutional" – 53 years before Trump made the same bogus claim.

Congress, undeterred, overrode Nixon's veto by mustering the votes of more than two-thirds of the members in both chambers.

The House and Senate are largely not in session now. And who knows what will happen between Trump and Iran by the time Congress returns to Washington in a week.

But it's time for more rank-and-file Republicans to call for accountability. A joint resolution in the Senate on April 30 called for an end to the war due to a lack of congressional approval. That failed in a 50-47 vote, but two Republicans, Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Rand Paul of Kentucky, backed it.

I know I'm calling for a tough vote here. On May 1, with the 60-day deadline at hand, Trump decided to deliver a campaign speech in Florida. There, he suggested it is "treasonous" to criticize his war.

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That's the sort of venom he'll unleash on anyone, especially a Republican in Congress, if they try to hold him accountable by law. That's as predictable as the sunrise.

Trump never had a coherent plan for this war. He clearly has no plan for how to end it. And he has told us he has no plans to follow the law. Republicans and Democrats in Congress need a plan of their own.