Republican Senator Jim Risch killed a Senate vote on curbing President Trump’s military powers in Venezuela via a procedural move Wednesday evening—after two GOP rebels who’d voted against Trump last week dramatically switched sides.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman argued the war powers resolution should be disregarded because no U.S. troops are currently engaged in hostilities in Venezuela.
But the procedural victory came only after Senators Josh Hawley and Todd Young—two of five Republicans who’d defied Trump just days earlier—reversed course following intense pressure from the White House.
Hawley’s flip was particularly striking. The Missouri populist had voted last Thursday to advance the resolution restricting Trump’s ability to wage war in Venezuela without Congressional approval, helping it pass 52-47.
But on Wednesday, Hawley told Punchbowl News he would vote with GOP leaders to kill the effort after Secretary of State Marco Rubio confirmed ‘there are currently no U.S. Armed Forces in Venezuela’ and promised to notify Congress of any troop movements.
Indiana Republican Todd Young—another of the original five GOP defectors—provided the final crucial vote. He’d cryptically told reporters Wednesday morning he would have ‘a lot more to say about that soon’ when asked about his position.
Hours before the vote, Senate Majority Leader John Thune admitted he wasn’t sure if he had the votes to stop the War Powers resolution from passing. The turnabout also comes as the president has tempered his rhetoric on Iran, but continues to deliberate his options.
Trump had unleashed fury at the five Republican senators after last week’s procedural vote, naming Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Young and Hawley as members of Congress who ‘should never be elected to office again.’
This grab taken on January 3, 2026, from UGC footage released by Jose Abreu in his X account @Jabreu89, shows smoke billowing over Caracas after a series of explosions part of a US military operation that led to the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Madruo
President Donald Trump takes part in a signing ceremony in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, USA, 14 January 2026
The president described their move to restrain his military authority as one that ‘greatly hampers American Self Defense and National Security, impeding the President’s Authority as Commander in Chief.’
Democratic Senator Tim Kaine argued Wednesday that even though troops aren’t currently in combat in Venezuela, Operation Absolute Resolve—the January 3 raid that captured dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife—isn’t necessarily over.
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Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) gestures toward a crowd of supporters of President Donald Trump gathered outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 at the US Capitol in Washington, DC
Sen. Todd Young, R-Ind., speaks during a Senate Finance Committee hearing on the nomination of Chris Magnus to be the next U.S. Customs and Border Protection commissioner, Tuesday, Oct. 19, 2021 on Capitol Hill in Washington
The bipartisan war powers resolution, pushed by Kaine and Paul, came after US Special Forces captured Maduro earlier this month in an operation the Trump administration billed predominantly as law enforcement, not military action.
‘This is not an attack on the Maduro arrest warrant, but it is merely a statement that going forward, US troops should not be used in hostilities in Venezuela without a vote of Congress, as the Constitution requires,’ Kaine said last Thursday.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer accused Trump of preparing for ‘endless war’ and urged Republicans to vote against the President’s actions.
Even Senator John Fetterman, a Democrat vocal in supporting Trump’s capture of Maduro, voted to advance the war powers resolution last week.
Kaine insisted no lawmaker ‘has ever regretted a vote that just says, ‘Mr President, before you send our sons and daughters to war, come to Congress.”
