House lawmakers had been scheduled to hear testimony next week from the head of military operations in the Middle East, but the Republican majority postponed the hearing until late May.
Republicans in Congress have scrapped an opportunity to publicly question senior Pentagon officials next week on the war in Iran, postponing a scheduled hearing until late May as they continue to resist exercising oversight of the far-reaching military operation.
The House Armed Services Committee had scheduled testimony by Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of U.S. Central Command, and Gen. Dagvin R.M. Anderson, leader of the military’s Africa Command, on April 21.
But majority Republicans put off the session until May 19. And it was not certain whether a Senate panel scheduled to hear from the same officials on April 23 would go forward with that hearing either.
The senior Democrat on the House committee, who said the delay was based on Admiral Cooper’s availability and his being “busy with the war,” criticized the move, arguing that it would deprive lawmakers of a crucial chance to get answers about the conflict.
“Congressional oversight is crucially important,” said Representative Adam Smith of Washington, the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee. “We are six weeks into this conflict. And we still haven’t gotten a public briefing from anyone in the administration about the war.”
The hearing had been intended to serve as the annual review of the Defense Department’s operations and policies in the Middle East and Africa as lawmakers gear up to write the annual defense policy bill for 2027. Democrats had already been clamoring for a separate public hearing focused strictly on the war, in addition to the routine session.
“But now we’re not even getting that” for another month, Mr. Smith said, saying the postponement would mean that lawmakers would continue to go without answers to questions about the strategic goals, total costs and broader regional implications of the war.
The deferral comes after President Trump on Sunday ordered a “complete” American blockade of the Strait of Hormuz that would take effect on Monday, though U.S. Central Command later said it would seek to stop only vessels transiting to or from Iranian ports. Asked whether the Senate Armed Services Committee would go ahead with its scheduled testimony from Admiral Cooper and General Anderson on April 23, the Republican chairman, Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi, would not comment.
Heather Vaughan, a spokeswoman for Representative Mike Rogers of Alabama, the chairman of the House committee, said the public hearing with Admiral Cooper was “critically important.”
“Given his focus on the dynamic situation in Iran, we’re rescheduling to make sure he can be present so committee members can hear his testimony and ask questions about our posture in the Middle East,” she said.
Since the beginning of the U.S. strikes on Iran, Democrats have called for senior members of the Trump administration to testify on Capitol Hill.
But Republicans have made no effort to compel military commanders or members of the president’s cabinet to appear publicly and under oath answer questions from lawmakers.
“I don’t think that the majority is necessarily opposed to that type of public hearing,” Mr. Smith said. “The administration has just made it clear, and the Pentagon has made it clear, that they don’t want to provide it, and so the majority is willing to yield to that opinion.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is scheduled to testify before the House Armed Services Committee on April 29 for the first time since the war began. That session will fall exactly 60 days after Mr. Trump ordered strikes on Tehran on Feb. 28. But it will be at an annual budget hearing, not an oversight hearing focused on the war.
