Senator Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin and a close ally of President Trump, warned that the president would lose his support if he struck Iran’s civilian infrastructure, offering a rare public glimmer of unease among G.O.P. lawmakers as Mr. Trump escalates his threats against Tehran.
“I do not want to see us start blowing up civilian infrastructure,” Mr. Johnson said Monday on the podcast “John Solomon Reports,” in an interview that took place the day before Mr. Trump warned that Iran’s “whole civilization will die.” After that warning, Mr. Johnson told The Wall Street Journal that Mr. Trump would forfeit his backing and it would be “a huge mistake,” if he carried out his threat to bomb Iran “back to the Stone Ages.”
Still, Mr. Johnson left room for the possibility that Mr. Trump’s bellicose language might merely be strategic posturing: “I hope and pray that President Trump is just using this as bluster.”
His words of caution came as Republicans, who are absent from Washington during a two-week congressional recess, have either stayed mum or rallied publicly in lock step with Mr. Trump on Iran, even as his escalating threats have drawn criticism from Democrats and concern from legal experts who say the moves he is forecasting could violate international law.
Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader, and Speaker Mike Johnson did not respond to requests for comment.
But after Tuesday’s social media post from when Mr. Trump warned of striking Iran with enough force “never to be brought back again,” Senate Republicans’ official social media account warned that “Iran would be wise to take President Trump at his word,” adding that Tehran could choose “the easy way or the hard way.”
With some commentators on the right balking at Mr. Trump’s warlike language, some of his allies in Congress have sought to allay fears that the president, who ran for office denouncing foreign wars, is plunging the United States into a prolonged one in the Middle East.
“President Trump is trying to actually turn the temperature down,” Representative Pat Harrigan, Republican of North Carolina, said during an interview on Fox News.
Representative Jodey Arrington, Republican of Texas, cheered Mr. Trump’s aggressive posture, telling the network: “Thank God we have a commander in chief that is not full of empty rhetoric.”
A few voices in the G.O.P. have gently urged a more cautious approach by Mr. Trump, including calling for Congress to play more of a role in the Iran conflict.
In a lengthy post on X, Representative Nate Moran, Republican of Texas, said he had supported the president’s moves on Iran so far, but warned that the United States must conduct military operations “for just causes and through just and moral means.”
“So let me be clear,” he wrote. “I do not support the destruction of a ‘whole civilization.’ That is not who we are, and it is not consistent with the principles that have long guided America.”
And on Tuesday afternoon, Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, pushed back strongly on Mr. Trump’s social media post.
“The President’s threat that ‘a whole civilization will die tonight’ cannot be excused away as an attempt to gain leverage in negotiations with Iran,” Ms. Murkowski, who is weighing a bid to force a vote in Congress to place parameters on the war, wrote on X. “Everyone involved —especially the President and Iran’s leaders — must de-escalate their unprecedented saber-rattling before it is too late.”
Robert Jimison covers Congress for The Times, with a focus on defense issues and foreign policy.
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