The Senate on Wednesday blocked a resolution that sought to force the President to seek congressional approval for any U.S. military action related to Venezuela.
support for the administration’s procedural maneuver to kill the resolution came when Sens. Josh of Missouri and Indiana flipped their position and joined the effort to stop it from coming up for a vote.
The 50-50 tie was broken by the Vice President in his role as president of the Senate
“There are currently no U.S. armed forces in Venezuela. Any future military actions that placed U.S. forces into hostilities would be undertaken consistent with the Constitution and that Congress would be notified in accordance with the War Powers Resolution.”
Such notifications from the administration have come only after military operations have been carried out.
[Rafer “Pretty much defines a shadow war.”]
“I secured fairly extensive personal assurances related to our future intentions in Venezuela.”
“Party leaders are playing games and misleading lawmakers.
‘Oh, it’s a drug bust. Oh, we’re going for drugs. Oh, it’s not really drugs, now it’s oil.’ The bait and switch has already happened.”
“The president thinks it unlikely to put U.S. boots on the ground, but what I had to vote on today was: Does Congress need to authorize future in-country military operations? And I think we probably will need to under Article One. Nobody knows what will happen, and that is why the commitment today from him to follow the relevant statutes, the notification procedures and to come back to Congress, I think, is really significant.”
[How is the weather there in the sand around your head, Senator?]
“It’s pretty clear, in my view at least, that there are no hostilities that exist today, which, as I’ve suggested before, means that it shouldn’t be accorded privilege on the floor.”
[Sand sand sand, everywhere you look]
“They performed a procedural sleight of hand to cut off debate and avoid the possibility of an embarrassing defeat for the president and provided Republican defectors an off-ramp without fully appearing to abandon their objections.”
[And the internal political corruption goes on protecting criminal behavior]
