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Five Republican senators joined Democrats to advance legislation that would block President Donald Trump from launching future attacks on Venezuela without congressional approval, handing the president a symbolic rebuke hours after he said the U.S. could oversee the country’s affairs for years.
While the vote will have no immediate impact on the ground, it sends a stark message to Trump that even some Republicans are displeased with his open-ended plans for Venezuela.
A U.S. attack on Venezuela on Saturday left dozens of people dead and President Nicolás Maduro and his wife in U.S. custody.
All Democrats voted to advance the war powers resolution co-sponsored by Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky.
Republicans Susan Collins of Maine, Todd Young of Indiana, Josh Hawley of Missouri, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska also voted in favor, bringing the final vote to 52-47. Republican Sen. Steve Daines of Montana did not vote.
The procedural vote moves the bill forward for consideration. It will require an additional vote to pass.
Ahead of Thursday’s vote, Democrats pointed to Trump’s comments in a New York Times interview that seemed to point to a potentially yearslong entanglement in Venezuela.
“Donald Trump is ready for an endless war in Venezuela, and Lord knows where else,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said. “The American people are not. The American people want us to focus on the number one issue they face: the rising costs that they can’t afford, the things they need, the affordability crisis.”
Republican leaders, meanwhile, tried to cast the resolution as an attempt by Democrats to damage the president politically. Sen. Jim Risch of Idaho, the chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, argued that the resolution would be meaningless because there are no active hostilities with Venezuela.
“The purpose of this resolution is to slap the president in the face. It will do nothing it purports to do, because it can’t stop something that isn’t going on right now,” Risch said. “Unlike the former president, President Trump demonstrated he is a man of action. He was decisive and did what he promised the American people he would do, and that is to keep them safe.”
Collins, Young, and Hawley flipped their votes after previously opposing similar resolutions that would have prevented Trump from acting against Venezuela.
Collins faces what is likely to be a tough reelection challenge later this year. Young is not up for reelection until 2028, and Hawley until 2030.
“I believe invoking the War Powers Act at this moment is necessary, given the President’s comments about the possibility of ‘boots on the ground’ and a sustained engagement ‘running’ Venezuela, with which I do not agree,” Collins said in a statement.
Young, a Marine veteran, teamed up with Kaine last month to formally repeal the authorization for the use of military force against Iraq that had remained on the books since the 2003 U.S. invasion of that country.
Kaine made a significant concession to wavering Republicans on the Senate floor ahead of the vote, stating that the execution of an open arrest warrant for Maduro may have been valid by itself.
“This is bigger than an arrest warrant. More than 200 enemies have been killed. U.S. troops have been injured. Two are still hospitalized. And now we understand after the hearing yesterday, and what has been made public, this will go on for a long period of time,” Kaine said. “This is not an attack on the arrest warrant, but it is merely a statement that going forward U.S. troops should not be used in hostilities in Venezuela without the vote of Congress as the Constitution requires.”
If ultimately passed by the Senate, the resolution would also need to pass the House of Representatives and survive a likely veto from Trump in order to become effective. Its slim margin of victory in the Senate means that it would not be able to clear the two-thirds share needed for victory at present.
Separately, a bipartisan group of House members announced Thursday that they are reintroducing a war powers resolution in the lower chamber. The House voted 213-211 last month against a similar war powers resolution.
This is a developing story and may be updated.
