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Senate GOP Kills Bill That Would Block Trump Boat Bombings and War on Venezuela
"Shame on the Republicans who continue to shirk their duty and deny their constituents a voice," said one retired US Army general.
Nov 06, 2025
Senate Republicans on Thursday rejected a bipartisan war powers resolution aimed at stopping the Trump administration from continuing its bombing of alleged drug boats or attacking Venezuela without lawmakers' assent, as required by law.
US senators voted 51-49 against the measure introduced last month by Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). Two Republicans—Paul and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska—joined Democrats and Independents in voting for the resolution.
"It's sad that only two Republicans voted in favor," Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the peace group CodePink, said on X following the vote. "So much for 'America First' and for upholding their constitutional authority by stopping the executive branch from taking illegal military actions."
Retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, a senior adviser to the group VoteVets, said in a statement that President Donald Trump "is waging a war that he unilaterally declared and refuses to get approved by the American people via their representation in Congress."
"It isn't just criminal and unconstitutional, it betrays those who did fight on battlefields and spilled blood to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States," Eaton added. "Shame on the Republicans who continue to shirk their duty and deny their constituents a voice."
VoteVets' MG Paul Eaton (Ret) blasts GOP Senators for rejecting Senator Tim Kaine's War Powers Resolution. He says Trump is waging a "criminal and unconstitutional" war and betraying the principle that Americans shouldn't die without having a say in the matter, through their elected representatives.
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— VoteVets (@votevets.org) November 6, 2025 at 3:06 PM
The War Powers Resolution was passed over then-President Richard Nixon's veto in 1973 to affirm and empower Congress to check the president’s war-making authority. The law requires the president to report any military action to Congress within 48 hours and requires congressional approval of troop deployments exceeding 60 days.
It's been 63 days since the first-known Trump-ordered the first strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. At least 67 people have been killed in 16 such reported strikes since September 2, according to the Trump administration, which argues that it does not need congressional approval for the attacks.
Speaking on the Senate floor ahead of Thursday's vote, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said:
As we speak, America’s largest aircraft carrier, the Gerald Ford, is on its way to the Caribbean. It is part of the largest military buildup in our hemisphere that we’ve seen in decades. According to press reports, Donald Trump is considering military action on Venezuelan territory. But it also sounds like nobody really knows what the plan is, because like so many other things with Donald Trump, he keeps changing his mind. Who knows what he will do tomorrow?
Trump has also approved covert CIA action in Venezuela and has threatened to attack targets inside the oil-rich country. The government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro recently claimed that his country’s security forces had captured a group of CIA-aligned mercenaries engaged in a “false-flag attack” against the nation.
Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said after Thursday's vote: “Today, I was proud to once again cast my vote for Senator Kaine’s war powers resolution. President Trump is acting against the Constitution by moving toward imminent attacks against Venezuela without congressional authorization. In doing so, he is risking endless military conflict with Venezuela and steamrolling over the right of every American to have a say in the use of US military force."
“Asserting Congress’s constitutional role in war is not some procedural detail; it is fundamental. Our government is based on checks and balances, and Congress’s authority to declare war is a core principle of what makes America a democracy," Markey added. "Going to war without consulting the people is what monarchies and dictatorships do. Strong democracies must be willing to debate these issues in the light of day.”
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Echoes of Obama Libya Strikes as Trump Argues Boat Bombings Are Immune From War Powers Law
"It is a power grab in the service of killing people outside the law based solely on the president's own say so," said one expert.
Nov 03, 2025
The Trump administration reportedly told members of Congress that the president's deadly, unauthorized airstrikes on vessels in international waters can continue indefinitely, deploying a rationale that the Obama administration applied to its 2011 bombing of Libya.
The Washington Post reported Saturday that "T. Elliot Gaiser, head of the Trump administration's Office of Legal Counsel, made his remarks to a small group of lawmakers this week amid signs that the president may be planning to escalate the military campaign in the region, including potentially hitting targets within Venezuela."
Under the 1973 War Powers Resolution, the president has 60 days to terminate military operations not approved by Congress. The 60-day clock starts when the president notifies Congress of military action.
Monday marks the 60th day since Trump informed Congress of his first strike on a boat in the Caribbean in early September. The strike killed 11 people whom the administration accused without evidence of trying to smuggle drugs from Venezuela to the United States.
Trump has since authorized more than a dozen other strikes on boats in international waters, killing more than 60 people in what human rights organizations and United Nations experts have described as blatant violations of US and international law.
The Trump administration has told lawmakers that the US is engaged in "armed conflict" against drug cartels that the president has designated as "terrorist organizations."
But the White House is insisting that Trump's military actions in international waters are not constrained by the War Powers Resolution, claiming the operations "do not rise to the level of 'hostilities'" because the administration says American troops are not likely to be put in danger.
Brian Finucane, a former legal adviser at the State Department who now works at the International Crisis Group, observed Monday that the Trump administration's narrow definition of hostilities echoes "arguments made by the Obama administration in 2011 with respect to the military intervention in Libya."
"The Obama administration's interpretation of 'hostilities' was not well received, including by the US Congress," Finucane wrote, pointing to a May 18, 2011 letter that Republican senators sent to Obama accusing him of flouting the War Powers Resolution.
One of those GOP senators—Rand Paul of Kentucky—is backing a bipartisan war powers effort to prevent Trump from unilaterally and unlawfully attacking Venezuela.
Finucane stressed that the implications of the Trump administration's decision to interpret hostilities narrowly "are significant," noting that it paves the way for the US government to "continue its killing spree at sea, notwithstanding the time limits imposed by the War Powers Resolution."
"Second, the executive is arrogating to itself greater power over the use of force that constitutionally is the prerogative of Congress," Finucane added. "It is a power grab in the service of killing people outside the law based solely on the president's own say so."
On Saturday, Drop Site reported that the Trump administration has expanded its "drug cartel target list" to include sites inside Colombia and Mexico amid concerns that the president could soon attack Venezuela and launch an effort to overthrow the nation's president, Nicolás Maduro.
"At an Oval Office meeting in early October, Trump administration officials and top generals discussed escalating the pressure on Venezuela to go beyond the semi-regular attacks on boats in the Caribbean," the outlet reported. "The discussed plans include striking on land inside Venezuela... The same October 2 meeting included a previously reported directive from President Trump, who dialed his special envoy Richard Grenell into the call, telling him to cut off diplomatic communications with Maduro."
Asked during a newly aired "60 Minutes" interview if he believes Maduro's days as Venezuela's president are "numbered," Trump responded, "I would say yeah."
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UN Human Rights Chief Says Trump Must Halt 'Extrajudicial Killing' in International Waters
"None of the individuals on the targeted boats appeared to pose an imminent threat to the lives of others or otherwise justified the use of lethal armed force against them under international law," said Volker Türk.
Oct 31, 2025
The United Nations' top human rights official said Friday that US President Donald Trump's deadly strikes on boats in international waters in recent weeks amount to "extrajudicial killing" that must stop immediately, remarks that came as the White House appeared poised to expand the unlawful military campaign to targets inside Venezuela.
Volker Türk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, said of the administration's boat strikes that "these attacks—and their mounting human cost—are unacceptable."
"The US must halt such attacks and take all measures necessary to prevent the extrajudicial killing of people aboard these boats, whatever the criminal conduct alleged against them," said Türk, noting that the administration has not substantiated its claim that those killed by the strikes in waters off Central and South America were smuggling drugs.
The Trump administration has also kept secret a US Justice Department memo purportedly outlining an internal legal justification for the deadly strikes.
Türk noted that "countering the serious issue of illicit trafficking of drugs across international borders is—as has long been agreed among states—a law-enforcement matter, governed by the careful limits on lethal force set out in international human rights law."
"Under international human rights law, the intentional use of lethal force is only permissible as a last resort against individuals who pose an imminent threat to life," said the UN human rights chief. "Based on the very sparse information provided publicly by the US authorities, none of the individuals on the targeted boats appeared to pose an imminent threat to the lives of others or otherwise justified the use of lethal armed force against them under international law."
The Trump administration's strikes have killed more than 60 people thus far. At least one of the targeted vessels appeared to have turned around before the US military bombed it, killing 11 people.
Türk's statement came as the Miami Herald reported that the Trump administration "has made the decision to attack military installations inside Venezuela and the strikes could come at any moment."
Trump has said publicly that land strikes inside Venezuela would be the next phase of the military assault, which he has described as a "war" on drug cartels. The president has not yet received—or even sought—congressional authorization for any of the military actions taken in the Caribbean and Pacific.
In a statement last week, a group of UN experts denounced the Trump administration's strikes and belligerent posturing toward Venezuela as "an extremely dangerous escalation with grave implications for peace and security in the Caribbean region."
"The long history of external interventions in Latin America must not be repeated,” the experts said.
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