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War-Making Belongs to Congress―and the Oil Belongs to the People of Venezuela
The question is not whether a particular president’s motives are sincere, nor whether a foreign government is flawed. The question is whether the United States will remain governed by law―or by precedent accumulated through silence.
Jan 09, 2026
The recent Senate debate over U.S. military action in Venezuela exposes a fundamental rupture in American constitutional governance: who has the authority to initiate war. The Constitution answers that question plainly. Yet modern practice―and the arguments advanced in defense of it―have drifted dangerously far from that design. Alongside this constitutional crisis stands a second, inseparable issue: whether the United States may lawfully claim control over the natural resources of another sovereign nation, specifically Venezuela’s oil, under the threat of force.
These questions are not abstract. They determine whether the United States remains governed by law or by precedent accumulated through executive action and congressional silence.
At the center of the debate are two sharply opposed views articulated on the Senate floor. One asserts that the President, as Commander in Chief, may unilaterally use military force whenever he deems it necessary to advance national interests, with Congress relegated to the limited roles of funding restriction or impeachment after the fact. The other insists that the power to initiate war belongs exclusively to Congress, not as a technicality, but as a deliberate constitutional safeguard against impulsive, personalized, or imperial war-making.
Constitutional design and deliberate restraint lie at the heart of the Framers’ intent. Article I of the Constitution vests in Congress―not the President―the power to declare war. Article II assigns the President the authority to command the armed forces once war is authorized and to repel sudden attacks. This division was not accidental. It reflected deep skepticism, shared across the Founding generation, that executives are structurally inclined toward war. James Madison warned that the executive branch is “most prone to it,” driven by secrecy, ambition, and the temptation of unilateral action.
Bombing a foreign capital, removing a sitting head of state, and threatening prolonged military occupation are acts of war by any ordinary, historical, or legal definition. The Constitution does not permit semantic evasions to substitute for authorization.
The Framers, therefore, made war intentionally difficult to launch. They placed the decision in a deliberative body accountable to the people, requiring public debate, recorded votes, and political responsibility. That Congress has too often failed to exercise this duty does not diminish the Constitution’s command. Repeated violations do not convert usurpation into legality. Historical drift explains how power migrated; it does not justify why it should remain there.
Attempts to rebrand large-scale military operations as “law enforcement,” “arrest warrants,” or “limited actions” do not change their substance. Bombing a foreign capital, removing a sitting head of state, and threatening prolonged military occupation are acts of war by any ordinary, historical, or legal definition. The Constitution does not permit semantic evasions to substitute for authorization.
The War Powers Resolution―and the myth of congressional overreach is often invoked as the supposed villain. Critics claim that the 1973 War Powers Resolution is unconstitutional because it allegedly transforms Congress into “535 commanders-in-chief.” This argument inverts constitutional logic. The Resolution does not empower Congress to command troops; it reasserts Congress’s authority to decide whether hostilities initiated by the executive may lawfully continue. It exists precisely because Congress had been sidelined, not because it had seized power.
The statute’s reporting requirements and time limits are accountability mechanisms, not vetoes of military command. Congress’s true failure has not been excessive interference but persistent abdication―avoiding the political responsibility of authorizing war while permitting presidents to act first and justify later. That abdication corrodes checks and balances and transfers the gravest decision a democracy can make into the hands of one person.
Sovereignty, coercion, and Venezuela’s oil bring the constitutional crisis into sharp international focus. The claim that the United States may seize, sell, or administer Venezuelan oil for “mutual benefit” or reconstruction collapses under legal scrutiny. As reaffirmed by the United Nations Secretary-General, Venezuela’s oil belongs to the Venezuelan people. This is not rhetoric; it is a cornerstone principle of international law grounded in state sovereignty and permanent sovereignty over natural resources.
Any alleged “agreement” cited by the Trump administration with a Venezuelan interim authority cannot be credibly described as a genuine agreement at all. Consent extracted under duress is not consent. When a population faces a clear and present threat of escalating military force―further ground operations, hundreds more civilian deaths, and a highly probable invasion―what follows is not agreement but coerced acquiescence. Allowing foreign control of national resources under the shadow of overwhelming military power is not voluntary cooperation; it is survival under threat.
The decision to go to war is not merely strategic. It is moral, constitutional, and irrevocable.
International law does not recognize resource transfers imposed by force or intimidation as legitimate. To do so would resurrect a doctrine of conquest the modern international order was built to reject. If oil may be seized in Venezuela today because military pressure makes resistance impossible, it may be seized anywhere tomorrow by any power willing to invoke its own version of “national interest.”
Such actions erode not only international norms but the United States’ own legal and moral standing. They convert foreign policy from diplomacy into extraction and military power from defense into appropriation.
Democratic accountability and the cost of war demand a return to constitutional first principles. The decision to go to war is not merely strategic. It is moral, constitutional, and irrevocable. It places citizens in harm’s way, reshapes international relations, and unleashes consequences that last generations. That is precisely why the Constitution assigns the initiation of war to Congress.
Congressional authorization does not weaken national security; it strengthens it by conferring legitimacy, public consent, and strategic clarity. History shows that when the United States has truly been attacked, Congress has acted swiftly and decisively. What the Framers sought to prevent was not defense, but adventurism―wars launched without deliberation, accountability, or consent.
Allowing one individual to initiate war, seize foreign leaders, and appropriate another nation’s resources without congressional approval collapses the separation of powers and invites abuse. It replaces law with discretion, deliberation with impulse, and sovereignty with force.
In the end, the question is not whether a particular president’s motives are sincere, nor whether a foreign government is flawed. The question is whether the United States will remain governed by law―or by precedent accumulated through silence. On that question, the Constitution is unambiguous.
War begins with Congress.
And Venezuela’s oil belongs to Venezuelans.
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Estimated Cost of Trump Naval Blockade of Venezuela Climbs Toward $1 Billion
"US military power is being used as a de facto security force for the president's corporate donors and their oil interests, leaving the American taxpayer to effectively subsidize a security force for Big Oil."
Jan 08, 2026
As Congress weighs action to rein in the Trump administration's assault on Venezuela—as demanded by people across the United States and Latin America—Fortune on Thursday highlighted the rising cost of just the US oil blockade on the country.
The ongoing US naval blockade "has cost an estimated $700 million and counting, with two more oil tankers seized January 7, as President Donald Trump aims to sell more Venezuelan crude oil to American refineries and convince U.S. oil companies to return to embattled nation," the outlet reported.
That's based on a Center for a New American Security analysis that put the cost of operating the USS Gerald R. Ford and its aircraft carrier strike group in the region since October at more than $9 million a day—which does not account for Trump's illegal strikes on alleged drug smuggling boats or the weekend abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
Fortune's article followed December reporting on "the lopsided cost of Operation Southern Spear" from Defense One:
The estimates for every hour of the carrier’s operation is roughly $333,000, while each escort consumes a comparatively cheaper $9,200 per hour.
For the aircraft, the cost per flight hour is roughly $40,000 for the F-35s and the AC-130J; $29,900 for the P-8s; and $3,500 for the Reaper drones.
Then there are the munitions used in the attacks themselves. Analysis of the strike videos show that U.S. forces have fired Hellfire missiles (about $150,000 to $220,000 apiece) AGM-176 Griffins ($127,333 in FY2019 costs), and perhaps GBU-39B Small Diameter Bombs (roughly $40,000 each).
And on the personnel side, there is the pay and benefits for the roughly 15,000 US service members who have been deployed so far in the operation, including 5,000 ashore in Puerto Rico and 2,200 Marines aboard ships.
As for "Operation Absolute Resolve," as the US called the mission to abduct Maduro and Flores, the administration has not disclosed costs, but Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that nearly 200 special forces took part in the deadly raid.
The New York Times reported Saturday that "the military had been readying for days to execute the mission," and "in the run-up, Delta Force commandos rehearsed the extraction inside a full-scale model of Mr. Maduro's compound that the Joint Special Operations Command had built in Kentucky."
After being abducted, Maduro and his wife pleaded not guilty to narco-terrorism charges in a federal court in New York City. Trump has continued to make clear that his costly operations are not actually about drugs, but seizing Venezuelan oil. Senate Democrats are now probing possible dealings between his administration and fossil fuel executives related to the US attack on Saturday.
As the U.S. pursues regime change in Venezuela, it's worth remembering that the U.S.-led post-9/11 wars left millions dead and cost U.S. taxpayers trillions, with no strategic benefit to the citizens of the U.S. or any other nation. www.wsj.com/world/americ...
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— The Costs of War Project (@costsofwar.bsky.social) January 5, 2026 at 12:05 PM
On Tuesday, a pair of experts at the Center for American Progress (CAP) noted that the fossil fuel industry gave at least $96 million to Trump's 2024 campaign and super political action committees, "over $100 million to Trump allies and ads supporting policies championed by these allies, and more through undisclosed dark money channels," and then "contributed at least $41 million to either the inaugural fund or Trump's super PAC after the election."
"However, it is unclear whether many American oil companies actually view Venezuela as an attractive prospect: With prices hovering around $60 per barrel of oil, companies have been reluctant to make major new investments," explained CAP's Damian Murphy Allison McManus. "Venezuela's oil infrastructure will require billions of dollars to update in the medium term, and the political instability and potential security breakdowns that come from removing a head of state create a poor environment for long-term investments."
"That isn't to say that companies are completely uninterested: Some US oil companies are looking to collect billions of dollars from the country over decades-old seized oil assets," they continued. "To sweeten the deal, Trump recently has floated the prospect of subsidizing companies for rebuilding infrastructure. Still, this tepid response from the industry only underscores the chaotic and reckless nature of the administration’s foreign policymaking, which has adopted an 'act first, plan later' approach."
The pair also pointed out that "Trump has repeatedly suggested that boots on the ground could be used to guarantee access to oil resources, with the current buildup of forces signaling that a 'second wave' of military action is on standby. In essence, US military power is being used as a de facto security force for the president's corporate donors and their oil interests, leaving the American taxpayer to effectively subsidize a security force for Big Oil."
Alarmed by Trump's recent actions in and around Venezuela, the Senate on Thursday advanced a bipartisan war powers resolution—but so far, the measure still lacks the Republican support needed to get to a final vote. Even if it passed the upper chamber, the legislation would also need to get through the GOP-controlled House of Representatives.
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Democrats Launch Probe to Learn What Trump Told Oil Giants About Venezuela Attack—and When
"Oil company executives seem to know more about Trump's secret plan to 'run' Venezuela than the American people," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren. "We need public Senate hearings NOW."
Jan 08, 2026
Democrats in the US Senate on Wednesday launched a formal investigation into possible dealings between the Trump administration and oil company executives related to Saturday's military assault on Venezuela, the kidnapping of President Nicolas Maduro, and the effort now underway to seize and control the Latin American nation's vast oil reserves.
Led by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.)—ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW)—the Democratic lawmakers, including Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and others, want to know more about "communications between major U.S. oil and oilfield services companies and the Trump Administration surrounding last week’s military action in Venezuela and efforts to exploit Venezuelan oil resources."
Following Saturday's strikes on Venezuela and the kidnapping of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores—which international law experts have said were clear breaches of both international law and US constitutional law–Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday that he had spoken to oil executives both "before and after" the covert military actions.
While other White House officials walked back Trump's statements, the senators behind the investigation say they want to know more about what was discussed, with whom, and when.
According to a statement, the lawmakers are "requesting documents and information regarding the companies’ knowledge of the strikes, discussions with Trump Administration officials before and since the operation, and plans to invest in Venezuela from the CEOs of BP America Inc., Baker Hughes, Chevron, Citgo Petroleum Corporation, ConocoPhillips, Continental Resources, ExxonMobil, Halliburton, SLB, Shell USA, Inc., and Weatherford International."
In a series of letters to the heads of those oil giants, the senators said, “President Trump’s own statements justifying the operation in terms of access to foreign energy resources and benefits to the US oil industry, reported repeated engagement between industry and government, and the suggestion that taxpayers could pay the cost of rebuilding Venezuela’s oil infrastructure raise serious concerns about how the Trump Administration engaged with the oil companies prior to his decision to use military force in Venezuela."
“We would like to know," the letters continue, "the extent to which US oil and gas companies such as yours had either advance knowledge of or the ability to shape American foreign policy decisions—especially given that Congress was kept in the dark concerning the use of force until after the strikes occurred.”
The lawmakers noted that Trump has also suggested that US taxpayer funds would be used to "help companies cover their costs to rebuild Venezuelan oil infrastructure," spend they warned could "cost American taxpayers billions more in the form of subsidies for the fossil fuel industry, which already benefits from over $700 billion annually in subsidies," citing analysis by the International Monetary Fund.
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