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adam schiff
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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Senate Dems Aim to Stop Trump 'From Dragging This Country Into War' With Venezuela
"Congress needs to assert its constitutional power to prohibit use of military force," stressed one of the war powers resolution's co-sponsors.
Nov 06, 2025
As the Trump administration argues that it can continue its extrajudicial assassination spree of alleged drug runners on the high seas without congressional approval, the US Senate is set to vote Thursday afternoon on a bipartisan war powers resolution that would block military action against Venezuela absent lawmakers' assent—as required by law.
Last month, Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) introduced a resolution to block US military "hostilities within or against Venezuela that have not been authorized by Congress," citing the War Powers Resolution of 1973 and Congress' sole ability to declare war under the Constitution.
Posting on X ahead of Thursday's vote, Schiff said that the measure's co-sponsors "are forcing a bipartisan vote to block the administration from dragging this country into war in South America."
"Congress needs to assert its constitutional power to prohibit use of military force," he added.
Trump has PUBLICLY threatened land strikes in Venezuela—after already killing at least 66 unknown people on boats in the Caribbean—unnecessarily putting the U.S. at risk of war. Here’s what @schiff.senate.gov, Senator Paul, and I are doing about it:youtube.com/shorts/TQKsF...
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— Senator Tim Kaine (@kaine.senate.gov) November 6, 2025 at 8:29 AM
Matt Duss, executive vice president of the Center for International Policy, a Washington, DC-based think tank, said Thursday that President Donald Trump "talks about himself as a historic peacemaker while continuing to order reckless military strikes and threatening to invade countries around the world."
"His actions violate both the Constitution and his own promises to be an anti-war president," he added.
This is the second time Kaine and Schiff have tried to introduce a Venezuela war powers resolution. Last month, Democratic Sen. John Fetterman joined his GOP colleagues in voting down a similar measure. Paul joined Democrats and Independent Sens. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) and Angus King (Maine) in voting for the legislation.
Since September 2, Trump has overseen 16 reported attacks on vessels allegedly transporting drugs in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean off the coast of South America, killing at least 67 people. Venezuelan and Colombian officials, as well as relatives of some of the slain men, assert that some victims were fishers and condemned the attacks as war crimes.
Trump—who deployed an armada of warships and thousands of troops off the coast of Venezuela—has also approved covert CIA action and, along with senior administration officials, threatened to attack targets on land inside the oil-rich country, which has long been subjected to US meddling, regime change, and deadly sanctions. Late last month, the government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro said that his country’s security forces captured a group of CIA-aligned mercenaries engaged in a "false-flag attack" against the nation.
The War Powers Resolution of 1973—also known as the War Powers Act—was enacted during the Nixon administration at the tail end of the US war on Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos to 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 mandates that lawmakers must approve troop deployments after 60 days.
That 60-day door closed on Monday. However, according to The Washington Post, Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel T. Elliott Gaiser told lawmakers this week that Trump is not bound by the War Powers Resolution, as the administration does not believe that the boat strikes legally meet the definition of "hostilities" because the victims of the attacks aren't fighting back.
The dubious argument that acts of US military aggression aren't hostilities isn't new—the Obama administration asserted similar immunity from the War Powers Resolution when it decided to attack Libya in 2011, leading to the ouster of longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi and over a decade of enduring conflict and division.
As Brian Finucane, a former State Department legal adviser who is now a senior official at the International Crisis Group, wrote for Just Security this week:
There are many flaws with the Trump administration’s reported interpretation of hostilities. As indicated in the legislative history, Congress understood the term “hostilities” to apply broadly, more broadly than “armed conflict.” The Obama administration’s prior attempt to restrictively interpret the term garnered strong bipartisan congressional opposition...
That the Trump administration would resort to creative lawyering to circumvent the limits of the War Powers Resolution is hardly a surprise... It nonetheless is yet another legal abuse and arrogation of power by the executive. And it is a power grab in the service of killing people outside the law based solely on the president’s own say-so.
"Congress needs to push back against this attempt by the White House to further encroach upon its constitutional prerogatives on the use of military force," Finucane added. "The legislative branch should reject the executive’s strained legal interpretation of the War Powers Resolution, including possibly in legislation. Congress should also continue efforts to halt these killings at sea and block an unlawful attack on Venezuela."
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‘They’re Going to Be, Like, Dead’: Trump Says Land Strikes on Venezuela Are Next
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro demanded "no crazy war, please!" as the Trump administration showed no sign of dialing back its unlawful military attacks.
Oct 24, 2025
President Donald Trump set off alarms Thursday when he signaled his administration would soon escalate its military campaign in Latin America.
For the last seven weeks, the Trump administration has conducted military strikes against purported drug boats in the Caribbean and the Pacific Ocean that have killed at least 37 people so far.
Even though many legal experts and human rights advocates consider the attacks to be illegal acts of extrajudicial murder, Trump said during a law enforcement roundtable at the White House that he is going to soon expand the campaign to attack purported drug traffickers who are traveling by land as well.
As The New York Times noted, Trump said he's going to launch these strikes without seeking any authorization from the US Congress.
“I don’t think we’re going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war,” said Trump. “I think we are going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country, OK? We are going to kill them, you know? They are going to be, like, dead.”
Trump: "I don't think we're necessarily going to ask for a declaration of war, I think we're just gonna kill people that are bringing drugs into our country. We're going to kill them. They're going to be, like dead." pic.twitter.com/55NQXpZ0jf
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 23, 2025
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, called Trump's comments a "blaring red warning signal for the rule of law."
The administration has claimed it is targeting boats to stop drug trafficking from Venezuela, despite the fact that the country is not a prominent source of either fentanyl or cocaine.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth indicated on Wednesday that the US is going to approach its new War on Drugs in the same way it approached the War on Terror, the result of which was two failed military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan that cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
"Narco-terrorists intending to bring poison to our shores, will find no safe harbor anywhere in our hemisphere," Hegseth wrote in a Wednesday post on X. "Just as al-Qaeda waged war on our homeland, these cartels are waging war on our border and our people. There will be no refuge or forgiveness—only justice."
Dozens of elected officials throughout Latin America on Thursday released a letter denouncing the Trump administration's military aggression in their regions, and France 24 reported on the same day that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro warned Trump against launching a "crazy war" against his nation.
"Yes peace, yes peace forever, peace forever. No crazy war, please!" said Maduro in a meeting with unions. The president has accused the Trump administration of seeking regime change.
Some US politicians have also denounced Trump's military aggression in Latin America.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) described Trump's boat attacks as a "stain on our moral conscience" and urged other lawmakers to speak up.
"This is not a time for the opposition party to be silent," he said. "We must speak out for our moral values and to stand against a new regime change war."
Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said that Trump must seek permission from Congress before launching any military strikes in Latin America.
"Legally, he is required to come to Congress," Schiff wrote on X. "Though he may not get the answer he expects. Americans don't want another war."
Former Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), a longtime critic of US foreign interventionism, also said the president is required to go through Congress before taking any military action.
"The Constitution doesn’t permit a president to act as the legislature and judiciary on top of being the chief executive," he wrote. "If it’s war, he must go to Congress. If it’s crime, he must go to court. When there’s no imminent danger, there’s no justification for unilateral strikes."
Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) slammed the administration for trying to employ tactics that failed in the War on Terror to a fight that it claims is targeting narcotics trafficking.
"Now the Trump administration is talking about 'regime change' in Venezuela," he wrote. "When has that ever worked for us—in Cuba, Afghanistan, or anywhere else? This isn’t making us safer. It's having the opposite effect."
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