Two More Americans Are Dead in Jordan - in a War No Congress Authorized, That Both Chambers Voted to End, and That the President Told Congress Was Already Over.

Two American service members were killed and one remains missing after Iranian ballistic-missile and drone strikes on a base in Jordan on July 17, US Central Command said, with four others evacuated for their wounds [3][4]. They are, by the military's own count, the 15th and 16th Americans to die in combat since the war with Iran began on February 28 [3]. Beneath the casualty figures sits a fact the numbers keep outrunning: no one authorized this war, and both chambers of Congress have voted to end it.

On June 3, the House passed a war-powers resolution directing the president to withdraw US forces from hostilities with Iran, 215 to 208 [1]. The Senate followed on June 23, 50 to 48, with four Republicans - Bill Cassidy, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, and Rand Paul - crossing over to join every Democrat [1]. The measure carries the plain sense of Congress that the war should stop [1].

Its practical force is another matter. The resolution is a concurrent one - it expresses the position of Congress but is not sent to the president for signature and does not bind him [1]. The war has continued anyway, over an explicit bipartisan vote to end it, and with no authorization ever passed to begin it.

The president's own account of the war has not matched the record either. In a May 1 letter to Congress, he wrote that 'the hostilities that began on February 28, 2026, have terminated' - a claim used to argue that the War Powers Resolution's 60-day deadline did not apply [2]. The hostilities did not terminate. The Navy continued blockading Iranian oil tankers through the spring, the June 17 ceasefire collapsed on July 8, and the United States has now bombed Iran for eight consecutive nights [2]. The two deaths in Jordan are the latest evidence that the war he described as over was not [3].

The toll now stands at a reported 16 American service members killed and more than 400 wounded since February [3][4]. The identities of the two killed in Jordan were withheld pending notification of their families [4]. Whatever else is disputed about this war, its legal foundation is not, because there is none - and the branch the Constitution assigns the power to declare war has already said, in both houses, that it wants this one to end [1].