It’s not just Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) — House Democrats say they intend to keep pushing floor votes to rein in President Donald Trump’s war powers.
A bipartisan House resolution on Venezuela is slated to ripen in the coming days. House supporters now have another opportunity to force consideration of a measure to limit military action in the country following the stunning capture of now former President Nicolás Maduro.
It’s unclear whether the provision’s champions — Reps. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) — want to see the resolution taken up on the floor immediately after it ripens.
But future House action is unlikely to be limited to just Venezuela. House Democrats, like Kaine in the Senate, said they would employ similar tactics if Trump takes military action against Iran.
“Congress is the one that has to authorize — no question,” House Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) told us.
“There is an opportunity to be on solid ground to get support from this Congress,” added Rep. Maggie Goodlander (D-N.H.). “There really is, and the decision not to do it is just another decision to divide us.”
The resolutions are an especially powerful tool for the minority party because they are privileged, meaning lawmakers can go around Republican leadership to force floor consideration.
A narrow defeat. The Senate last week voted to block a bipartisan Venezuela war powers resolution. But Kaine said on “Fly Out Day” that he and other supporters would continue offering war powers resolutions on countries as varied as Iran, Nigeria, Cuba, Mexico, Colombia and Greenland.
A separate bipartisan House push to remove troops from hostilities in or against Venezuela fell short on a 211-213 vote in December. At the time, three Republicans voted to support it: Massie, Rep. Don Bacon (Neb.) and former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.). Of course, that was before Maduro’s capture.
But Republican attendance has been an ongoing problem for leadership and could be pivotal here. Just a handful of absences and a few GOP defections could be enough to tip the war powers vote toward Democrats.
Rep. Henry Cuellar (Texas) was the only Democrat to oppose the prior Venezuela resolution. His office didn’t return a request for comment on this new effort.
Back in the Senate, Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) also has a war powers resolution ready for floor consideration that aims to remove U.S. forces from ongoing operations targeting suspected drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean.
But it’s unclear if Gallego would seek to force a vote on it anytime soon. Gallego also said he plans to tee up a separate resolution centered on Greenland.
This is new. A group of 76 Democrats, led by Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), are urging the Trump administration to push back aggressively against Israeli efforts to annex the West Bank. Read their letter here.
