Senate readies vote on Venezuela war powers as Trump pressures GOP defectors

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans are facing intense pressure from President Donald Trump to vote down a war powers resolution Wednesday that is aimed at limiting the president’s ability to carry out further military action against Venezuela.

Five GOP senators joined with Democrats to advance the resolution last week, but Trump has lashed out at the defectors as he tries to head off passage of the bill. Democrats are forcing the vote 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 fury being directed their way from the president underscored how the war powers vote has taken on new political significance as Trump expands his foreign policy ambitions in the Western Hemisphere.

The legislation, even if passed by the Senate, has 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.

At least one Republican reconsidering

Sen. Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican who helped advance the war powers resolution last week, has indicated he may change his position.

Hawley said that Trump’s message during a phone call last week 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.

“I’m in listening-and-receive mode at this time,” said Hawley, adding, “I don’t know how we’re going to proceed next on the floor.”

Sen. Todd Young, an Indiana Republican who also voted to advance the resolution, declined repeatedly to discuss his position but said he was “giving it some thought.” Collins had voted against similar war powers resolutions in previous months before voting last week to advance the one currently before the Senate.

Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine, who has brought a series of war powers resolutions this year, said he wasn’t surprised at Trump’s reaction to Congress asserting its ability to check the president.

“They’re furious at the notion that Congress wants to be Congress,” he said. “But I think people who ran for the Senate, they want to be U.S. senators and they don’t want to just vote their own irrelevance.”

The shifting rationale for military intervention

Trump has used a series of legal rationales 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.

As he exited the classified briefing room at the Capitol, Paul said, “Legal arguments and constitutional arguments should all be public, and it’s a terrible thing that any of this is being kept secret because the arguments aren’t very good.”

Lawmakers, including some 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.”

“It’s amazing. He’s concerned about the protesters in Iran, but not concerned about the damage that ICE is doing to the protesters and Americans in Minnesota and other places,” said Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, referring to the fatal shooting of a woman in Minnesota by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer.

How Senate will tackle the war powers resolution

Republican Senate leaders were looking for ways to defuse the conflict between their members and Trump and were eager to move on quickly to other business.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., questioned whether this war powers resolution should be prioritized under the chamber’s rules.

“We don’t have troops in Venezuela. There is no kinetic action. There are no operations. There are no boots on the ground,” he said, arguing that the legislation “doesn’t reflect what is current reality in Venezuela.”

But even if Republican leaders attempt to dismiss the legislation under those grounds, it would still get a vote.

Schumer said he hoped at least the five Republicans would hold to their position because they “understand how important this is.”

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Associated Press writers Lisa Mascaro and Joey Cappelletti contributed reporting.