Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) called for a fundamental overhaul of U.S. foreign policy on June 21, 2026, arguing the recently concluded war with Iran follows a pattern he traced back through Vietnam and Iraq. “WE NEED A NEW FOREIGN POLICY,” Sanders wrote on X. “Amidst the fiasco of the war in Iran, Americans need to rethink the very foundations of our foreign policy and how we go forward in a very different direction — a direction which focuses on peace, democracy and economic and social justice.”
The Historical Comparison
Sanders drew a direct line between the Iran war and two of the most contested conflicts in modern American history. “The war in Vietnam was based on a lie. In that war over 58,000 Americans died, hundreds of thousands were wounded and millions of Vietnamese civilians lost their lives,” he wrote. “The war in Iraq was based on a lie. In that war 4,492 Americans died, tens of thousands were wounded and hundreds of thousands Iraqi civilians lost their lives. The current war in Iran was based on a lie. In this war 14 Americans have been killed, hundreds have been wounded and up to ten thousand civilians in the region have lost their lives.”
The casualty figures Sanders cited for Vietnam and Iraq align closely with widely accepted historical totals. His figure of 14 American deaths in the Iran conflict is roughly consistent with Pentagon and CENTCOM figures, which have placed U.S. military deaths in the conflict in the range of 13 to 15, depending on how incidents such as a refueling aircraft crash are counted. His estimate of “up to ten thousand” regional civilian deaths is on the higher end of independent estimates; the New York Times has reported more than 1,700 civilian deaths inside Iran in just the first five days of the campaign, while broader regional tolls including Lebanon push cumulative figures into the thousands, though no single U.S. government source has published a consolidated figure matching Sanders’ upper estimate exactly.
Military Spending
Sanders connected the war’s costs to broader concerns about domestic economic priorities. “Meanwhile, with 60% of our people living paycheck to paycheck, we have a military budget of over one trillion dollars — much of it going to the extremely profitable military-industrial complex,” he wrote. The U.S. defense budget, including supplemental appropriations, has exceeded $800 billion in recent years and crossed the trillion-dollar threshold in the most recent appropriations cycle, a frequent point of emphasis in Sanders’ broader domestic policy platform.
Sanders’ Critique of Israel
Sanders directed some of his sharpest language at Israel, the United States’ closest ally in the conflict. He described Israel as “a nation, now controlled by right-wing extremists, which has committed genocide in Gaza, plotted with Trump to start the illegal and unconstitutional war in Iran, and is now actively obstructing a meaningful pathway towards peace as it continues to attack Lebanon’s civilian population.” Sanders has used the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s conduct in Gaza in numerous prior statements, a characterization that remains a matter of significant international and domestic political dispute, even as it has been adopted by a number of human rights organizations and some United Nations bodies.
Sanders’ Critique of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar
Sanders extended his criticism to three other U.S. partners in the region. On Saudi Arabia, he wrote that the country is “controlled by the wealthiest family in the world who run a dictatorship that treats women as third-class citizens and tolerates no opposition or dissent,” and cited the U.S. intelligence finding that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was responsible for the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul — a conclusion the U.S. intelligence community reached in a declassified report released in February 2021.
On the United Arab Emirates, Sanders described it as “an authoritarian monarchy with no free press, no free elections and no independent civil society,” built on migrant labor that he said makes up 80 percent of the population. He further alleged that the UAE “has armed the Rapid Support Forces — a paramilitary group the United States government has formally determined is committing genocide in Sudan.” That claim accurately reflects U.S. policy: the State Department formally determined in January 2025 that the RSF and allied militias had committed genocide in Sudan’s Darfur region, and the Treasury Department has separately sanctioned several RSF-linked companies based in the UAE for their role in procuring weapons for the group.
On Qatar, Sanders wrote that the country “is also an authoritarian monarchy controlled by the Al Thani family,” and cited reports that 91 percent of its population consists of migrant laborers, “ruthlessly oppressed,” adding that “thousands of workers died” during construction for the 2022 World Cup, a toll that has been widely documented by labor rights organizations and international media investigations in the years following the tournament.
Sanders’ Proposed Policy Shift
Sanders concluded his statement by outlining the foreign policy framework he believes should replace the current approach. “We need a foreign policy that actually reflects our values and which must start with a simple premise: the United States will not provide weapons and diplomatic cover to governments — whether in Tel Aviv, Riyadh, Abu Dhabi or Doha — that engage in systematic human rights violations,” he wrote, calling for an approach “centered around human rights, respect for international law and multilateralism — and one that holds war criminals accountable no matter whom they may be.”
Republican Pushback on Sanders’ Approach
Sanders’ framework of withholding U.S. weapons and diplomatic support from allies including Israel has drawn direct opposition from Senate Republicans on multiple occasions throughout the conflict. When Sanders forced votes in April on resolutions to block U.S. arms sales to Israel, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jim Risch (R-Idaho) argued the measures would backfire. “They will not help the United States of America,” Risch said ahead of the vote, warning the resolutions could embolden Iran and “send the message that the US is prepared to leave our ally Israel vulnerable.” Both resolutions failed, with Republicans unanimously opposed alongside a majority of Senate Democrats.
Sanders’ resolutions did draw growing Democratic support over time, a shift Sanders attributed to rising public skepticism of the war. “It’s clear that Democrats are beginning to listen to the average American who is sick and tired of spending billions of dollars to support Netanyahu’s horrific wars when people in this country can’t afford housing or health care,” Sanders said after one such vote in April, in which 40 senators supported blocking a bulldozer sale to Israel and 36 supported blocking a bomb sale, with all Republicans voting against both measures.
Sanders’ Consistent Record on the Conflict
The June 21 statement extends a position Sanders has maintained since the war’s outset. According to a statement on his official Senate website, Sanders said on February 28, 2026, the day the war began, that “President Trump, along with his right-wing extremist Israeli ally Benjamin Netanyahu, has begun an illegal, premeditated and unconstitutional war.” He has issued numerous follow-up statements throughout the conflict, including one in which he said the U.S. and Israeli strikes were “unraveling international law, the Geneva Conventions, and the legitimacy of the United Nations,” and another, following a Trump social media post about the conflict, in which Sanders wrote that the post amounted to “the ravings of a dangerous and mentally unbalanced individual,” urging Congress to “act NOW” to end the war.
No Formal Authorization Was Passed
Consistent with Sanders’ framing of the war as “unconstitutional,” Congress never passed a formal Authorization for Use of Military Force covering the Iran conflict. Multiple War Powers Resolutions aimed at ending or restricting the war were introduced in both chambers throughout the conflict; the House passed one such measure in early June by a vote of 215-208, while companion Senate measures were repeatedly blocked by Republican majorities, with the closest vote failing by a single vote in mid-June.
Sanders’ June 21 statement did not call for any specific new legislation, instead framing his remarks as a broader argument for reorienting the underlying principles of U.S. foreign policy beyond the immediate question of the Iran war’s resolution.