WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate is headed toward a vote Wednesday on a war powers resolution that would put a check on President Donald Trump's ability to carry out further military attacks on Venezuela, but two key Republicans reversed course on backing the legislation.
Trump put intense pressure on five Republican senators who joined with Democrats last week to advance the resolution. Two of the Republicans — Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Todd Young of Indiana — flipped under the pressure, giving Republican leaders the votes necessary to dismiss the legislation with a procedural maneuver.
The high-profile vote demonstrated how Trump still has command over much of the Republican Conference, yet there was still growing concern on Capitol Hill over the president’s aggressive foreign policy ambitions.
Democrats forced the debate after U.S. troops captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid earlier this month.
“Here we have one of the most successful attacks ever and they find a way to be against it. It’s pretty amazing. And it’s a shame," Trump said at a speech in Michigan Tuesday. He also hurled insults at several of the Republicans who advanced the legislation, calling Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky a “stone cold loser” and Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine “disasters.”
Trump's latest comments followed earlier phone calls with the senators, which they described as terse. The president's fury underscored how the war powers vote has taken on new political significance as Trump also threatens military action to accomplish his goal of possessing Greenland.
The legislation, even if passed by the Senate, had virtually no chance of becoming law because it would eventually need to be signed by Trump himself. But it represented both a test of GOP loyalty to the president and a marker for how much leeway the Republican-controlled Senate is willing to give Trump to use the military abroad.
Republican leaders move to dismiss the bill
Republican Senate leaders are trying to defuse the conflict between their members and Trump as well as move on quickly to other business. On Wednesday evening, they were moving to dismiss the measure under the argument that it is irrelevant to the current situation in Venezuela. That procedure was subject to a vote.
In a floor speech Wednesday morning, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., vented his frustration as he questioned whether this war powers resolution should be prioritized under the chamber’s rules.
“We have no troops on the ground in Venezuela. We’re not currently conducting military operations there,” he said. “But Democrats are taking up this bill because their anti-Trump hysteria knows no bounds.”
Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine, who has brought a series of war powers resolutions this year, accused Republicans of burying a debate about the merits of an ongoing campaign of attacks and threats against Venezuela.
"If this cause and if this legal basis were so righteous, the administration and its supporters would not be afraid to have this debate before the public and the United States Senate," he said in a floor speech.
Hawley, who helped advance the war powers resolution last week, said that Trump's message during a phone call was that the legislation “really ties my hands." The senator said he had a follow-up phone call with Secretary of State Marco Rubio that was “really positive.”
Hawley said that Rubio told him Monday "point blank, we’re not going to do ground troops.” The senator said he also received assurances that the Trump administration will follow constitutional requirements if it becomes necessary to deploy troops again to the South American country.
“We’re getting along very well with Venezuela,” Trump told reporters at a ceremony for the signing of an unrelated bill Wednesday.
As senators went to the floor for the vote, Young also told reporters he was no longer in support. He said that he had extensive conversations with Rubio and received assurances that the secretary of state will appear at a public hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Young also shared a letter from Rubio that stated the president will “seek congressional authorization in advance (circumstances permitting)” if he engaged in “major military operations” in Venezuela.
Under the Constitution, Congress alone has the ability to declare war. But U.S. presidents have long stretched their powers to use the might of the U.S. military around the globe.
Ohio State University professor Peter Mansoor, a military historian and retired U.S. Army colonel with multiple combat tours, said that trend since World War II allows Congress to shirk responsibility for war and put all the risk on the president.
In the post-Vietnam War era, lawmakers tried to take back some of their authority over wartime powers with the War Powers Resolution of 1973. It allows lawmakers to hold votes on resolutions to restrict a president from using military force in specific conflicts without congressional approval.
“Politicians tend to like to evade responsibility for anything -- but then this gets you into forever wars,” Mansoor said.
Trump has used a series of legal arguments for his campaign against Maduro.
As he built up a naval force in the Caribbean and destroyed vessels that were allegedly carrying drugs from Venezuela, the Trump administration tapped wartime powers under the global war on terror by designating drug cartels as terrorist organizations.
The administration has claimed the capture of Maduro himself was actually a law enforcement operation, essentially to extradite the Venezuelan president to stand trial for charges in the U.S. that were filed in 2020.
In a classified briefing Tuesday, senators reviewed the Trump administration's still undisclosed legal opinion for using the military for the operation. It was described as a lengthy document.
But lawmakers, including a significant number of Republicans, have been alarmed by Trump's recent foreign policy talk. In recent weeks, he has pledged that the U.S. will “run” Venezuela for years to come, threatened military action to take possession of Greenland and told Iranians protesting their government that “ help is on its way.”
Senior Republicans have tried to massage the relationship between Trump and Denmark, a NATO ally that holds Greenland as a semi-autonomous territory. But Danish officials emerged from a meeting with Vice President JD Vance and Rubio Wednesday saying a “fundamental disagreement” over Greenland remains.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said Trump's recent aggression amounted to a “dangerous drift towards endless war.”
More than half of U.S. adults believe President Donald Trump has “gone too far” in using the U.S. military to intervene in other countries, according to a new AP-NORC poll.
House Democrats have also filed a similar war powers resolution and can force a vote on it as soon as next week.
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Associated Press writers Lisa Mascaro and Joey Cappelletti in Washington and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.