Senate Votes to Move Ahead With War Powers Resolution in Rebuke of Trump

The Senate voted 52-47 Thursday to move forward with a War Powers Resolution that would curb President Donald Trump’s ability to expand military actions in Venezuela — the first rebuke yet by Congress of the president’s decision to act without its approval in the nation.

Along with Sen. Rand Paul, who co-led the effort with Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine, Republican Sens. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Todd Young and Josh Hawley voted to advance the resolution. Democratic Sen. John Fetterman, who was publicly undecided ahead of the vote, was also a “yes.”

The resolution will go for a final vote in the future.

The resolution would require the administration to obtain congressional approval before launching any further military hostilities in or against Venezuela.

Similar efforts to rein in Trump’s war powers have failed before, including Senate votes in October and November and two House measures in December in response to the president’s fatal strikes on boats of alleged drug traffickers and its seizure of oil tankers.

In November, only Murkowski and Paul voted to limit Trump’s war powers.

This vote, however, comes after the administration’s strikes on land in Venezuela to capture and prosecute its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

“The previous votes have been more hypothetical. This vote is about a real incursion,” Paul told reporters after the vote. “It’s about a real invasion of a foreign country. … I think the vote today reflects that more Republicans are taking it seriously.”

The vote came hours after Trump told The New York Times he expected U.S. oversight of Venezuela to last “much longer” than a few months, potentially years.

“Only time will tell,” Trump told the Times on Wednesday evening. “We will rebuild it in a very profitable way. We’re going to be using oil, and we’re going to be taking oil.”

The remarks reinforced what supporters of the bill have been warning for weeks: that the administration is pursuing an open-ended intervention in Venezuela without the legal authority required by the Constitution and could do the same elsewhere.

“I think it concerns people, the more they hear loose rhetoric like ‘Colombia, you’re next, Greenland, you’re next, watch out,’” Paul said.

Collins specifically mentioned Greenland in her statement about her vote.

“While I support the operation to seize Nicolas Maduro, which was extraordinary in its precision and complexity, I do not support committing additional U.S. forces or entering into any long-term military involvement in Venezuela or Greenland without specific congressional authorization,” she said.

After the vote, Hawley said he supported the resolution as a forward-looking check on potential escalation, although he said he believes the president has the authority to conduct ongoing boat strikes.

“I see this as a prospective thing going forward,” Hawley said. “If the DOD should recommend putting troops on the ground, the president should want to do that, I think Congress would need to be on the hook for that.”

Young echoed Hawley’s concern, saying the vote was not about a judgment on the past strikes but what might come next.

“The President and members of his team have stated that the United States now ‘runs’ Venezuela. It is unclear if that means that an American military presence will be required to stabilize the country,” he said in a statement. “I – along with what I believe to be the vast majority of Hoosiers – am not prepared to commit American troops to that mission. Although I remain open to persuasion, any future commitment of U.S. forces in Venezuela must be subject to debate and authorization in Congress.”

Most Republicans voted against advancing the resolution.

Despite previously raising concerns about expanding military action in Venezuela, Sen. Thom Tillis told NOTUS after the vote he opposed the resolution not because he disagreed with its intent but because of its timing.

“I think the timing is so close to the apprehension of Maduro that people would conflate the two. I’m 100% behind the extrication of Maduro,” he said. “If the administration gets a war footing there, then we can revisit, introduce the discussion of a War Powers Act resolution.”

Paul said he was not sure the resolution would wind up on Trump’s desk — it would first need to get final approval from the Senate and pass in the House. The White House has already issued a veto threat and published a statement of administrative policy opposing the bill’s passage.

“It’s still an important debate to have,” Paul said.

This article has been updated with comments from senators.