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By Ellie Cook
Senior Defense Reporter
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Three Republicans voted Wednesday to curb President Donald Trump's escalating pressure on Venezuela and strike campaign on alleged drug boats.
However, the votes were not enough to carry two Democrat-led resolutions to impose restrictions on military action against the South American country, and both failed narrowly.
Why It Matters
The U.S. has targeted a string of alleged drug boats in the southern Caribbean and the eastern Pacific since early September, killing 99 people, according to numbers from the administration. Proposed new legislation would have forced the Trump administration to seek congressional approval for its attacks.
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The votes are the first time Congress, which the Constitution grants the sole power to declare war, has formally weighed in on the military operation.
U.S. military assets close to Venezuela's coast have ballooned, with U.S. actions increasingly seen as a way to pressurize, and possibly to topple, Venezuela's authoritarian socialist leader, Nicolás Maduro.
What To Know
One resolution, from Massachusetts Democrat Jim McGovern of the House Rules Committee, attempted to "direct the removal of United States Armed Forces from hostilities within or against Venezuela that have not been authorized by Congress."
It narrowly failed 211-213 but won three Republican rebels: Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene, Don Bacon and Thomas Massie.
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Another resolution to block strikes against designated terrorist organizations in the Western Hemisphere tripped 210-216. The effort, led by the top Democrat in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Gregory Meeks, was backed by two Republicans: Bacon and Massie.
Two Democrats voted against: Vicente Gonzalez and Henry Cuellar, who was pardoned by Trump this month, both of Texas.
Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle attended a classified briefing earlier this week, after which Republicans largely backed the Trump administration's campaign and Democrats broadly called for more scrutiny on the legality of the attacks.
Many observers and former officials, as well as international experts and American allies, have questioned whether the strikes are breaking international and domestic law as well as undermining U.S. credibility on the world stage.
Admiral Frank Bradley, who oversaw the first attack on an alleged drug vessel on September 2, also appeared before lawmakers with the House and Senate Armed Services Committees on Wednesday. The September 2 strike came under fierce scrutiny after it emerged a follow-up attack killed two initial survivors.
The U.S. military said on Wednesday Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had authorized a fresh lethal strike on a vessel allegedly operated by an unnamed designated terrorist organization in the eastern Pacific. Four people were killed, the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said in a statement. This is at least the 26th known strike since September 2.
Trump on Tuesday said he would institute a "total and complete blockade of sanctioned oil tankers" going in or out of Venezuela, and said the country was "surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America."
Venezuela has consistently said the U.S. pressure on the country is related to the nation's vast proven oil reserves. Venezuela's state-owned oil and natural gas company, Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) insisted its operations were continuing as normal, although Maduro denounced U.S. statements as "warmongering."
The U.S seized an oil tanker off Venezuela's coastline earlier in December, a move Caracas condemned as "blatant theft and an act of international piracy."
What People Are Saying
“If it were about drugs, we'd bomb Mexico or China or Colombia,” Republican Representative Thomas Massie said, according to the Associated Press. “This is about oil and regime change."
"These strikes have not been authorized by Congress, and the administration has not sought Congressional authorization to use lethal military force to address alleged criminal activity that, under U.S. law, does not carry the death penalty," Representative Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, said on Wednesday. "That is a profound escalation, and one Congress has neither debated nor approved."
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