The Trump administration has declared a wartime emergency to bypass Congress and push through more than $23 billion in weapons sales to allies in the Middle East, the second time since the start of the war with Iran that it has circumvented the normal congressional approval process.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio determined that “an emergency exists requiring the immediate approval of critical arms transfers for Middle East partners currently under attack by Iran,” the State Department said in a statement on Thursday.
The Trump administration first declared an emergency soon after the U.S. and Israel launched joint strikes on Iran, in order to bypass Congress on the sale of more than 20,000 bombs to Israel. The Biden administration had also twice used an emergency declaration to sell weapons to Israel, for use during the Gaza war.
Such a declaration, while permitted under the Arms Export Control Act, is used by the White House and State Department only on rare occasions to sidestep the House and Senate committees that review and approve arms transfers. Mr. Rubio’s skirting of that congressional review process twice in less than two weeks is the latest move by the Trump administration to sidestep congressional oversight of the war.
The new proposed sale to the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Jordan encompasses 11 arms orders, according to the State Department. Some of the proposed sales had been under informal review by lawmakers, at least one of whom had yet to sign off. But the administration had not sent Capitol Hill even preliminary notice for a majority of the arms transfers it announced on Thursday, according to a U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive arms transactions.
Asked for comment, Representative Brian Mast, Republican of Florida and the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Mr. Rubio had “wisely” decided to declare an emergency and go around Congress after the top Democrat on his panel, Representative Gregory W. Meeks of New York, had refused to approve some of the proposed exports.
“He alone is holding up sales of needed weapons to Israel, U.A.E. and others,” Mr. Mast said of his Democratic counterpart.
Mr. Meeks said in a statement that he supported “our partners’ ability to defend themselves,” but added: “That support does not give this administration a blank check to ignore the law or Congress.”
Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, who also is among those who review arms transfers as the top Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, said partners in the region were “bearing the brunt of the Trump administration’s poorly planned war,” and that the United States “must do what we can to defend them.”
But, she added in a statement, the State Department’s “rushed decision to use an emergency authority and bypass Congress to send them arms highlights the administration’s frantic state” and its “lack of preparation and inability to incorporate allies, partners and Congress on the front end of major decisions like instigating a war.”
The informal review process for arms sales is a long-established norm that is the main vehicle for congressional oversight over weapons transfers. After the State Department sends a list of proposed sales to the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the top lawmaker from each party on those panels reviews the proposals.
Any of those four lawmakers can ask questions of the State Department for weeks or months before deciding whether to sign off. Once the administration gets approval from all four, it gives formal notification to Congress of the sales. The law allows Congress to block the transfers if both the House and Senate push through resolutions to do so within 30 days, but that rarely happens.
For the Emirates, the export list includes Chinook helicopters, drones, Patriot missiles and air-to-air missiles, kits to convert unguided bombs to guided ones, a THAAD advanced missile defense system radar and other equipment, an anti-drone system and F-16 fighter jet upgrades and munitions, according to a breakdown obtained by The New York Times that was more complete than the public announcements from the State Department.
Kuwait would purchase billions of dollars of air and missile defense equipment, and for Jordan there are F-16 fighter jet upgrades.
In 2019, the Trump administration declared a similar emergency with Iran to fast-track the sale of over $8 billion in munitions to the U.A.E. and Saudi Arabia, prompting an investigation by the State Department’s inspector general. Congress passed bipartisan resolutions to block the sales, but Mr. Trump vetoed the measures.
Several Senate Democrats have said they plan to force a similar vote next week on resolutions of disapproval for the weapons sales to Israel for which the State Department bypassed Congress in the early days of the war. Democrats have in the past split on votes to block arms to Israel.
“I would hope that my colleagues understand that it is absurd providing some 20,000 more bombs to Israel to continue the incredible destruction” in Iran and Lebanon, said Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats and is spearheading the measures.
John Ismay contributed reporting.
Megan Mineiro is a Times congressional reporter and a member of the 2025-26 Times Fellowship class, a program for early-career journalists.
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