Contributor: A Senate war powers resolution on Venezuela actually could curb Trump

President Trump appeared furious after the Senate voted last Thursday to move the war powers resolution to the next stage, where lawmakers can approve the measure and implement it. Restricting the president’s ability to wage war in Venezuela Without congressional authorization.

Embers in question That day, the five Republican senators who supported bringing the measure to a vote — Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Rand Paul (Ky.), Josh Hawley (Mo.) and Todd Young (Ind.) — “should never be elected to office again.”

Why would he be so angry that he would risk his own party’s control of the Senate in November? Even if this resolution passes both houses of Congress, he could veto it and ultimately be released. He did so in 2019, when a war powers resolution was passed in both the Senate and the House of Representatives mandating that the U.S. military halt its involvement in the war in Yemen. Many people think that this type of legislation cannot therefore make a difference.

But the president’s anger is telling. These political moves on the Hill can get results before the decision is voted on or even if it is vetoed by the president.

The Trump administration made significant concessions before the 2019 resolution was approved by Congress in an attempt to prevent its passage. For example, months before its approval, the US military stopped Saudi warplanes are being refueled in the air. These concessions eased the tension of the war and saved tens of thousands of lives.

The war powers resolution is an act of Congress based on the 1973 law of the same name. This law clarifies and strengthens our Constitution’s authority for Congress to decide when the U.S. military may engage in hostilities.

The US military raid in Caracas, where Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores were captured, is illegal under international law. rentals Organization of American States and United Nationsand other agreements to which the United States is a party. According to our Constitution, the government violates U.S. laws when they violate agreements our government has signed.

None of this has reined in the Trump administration, which has little respect for the rule of law. But the White House cares about the political power of Congress. If there is an expanded war in Venezuela or anywhere else where Trump has threatened to use the military, Congress taking steps to oppose it would increase the political cost to the president.

This is probably one of the main reasons why the Trump administration promised to at least make concessions on military action in Latin America, and who knows, maybe it made some concessions compared to what was planned.

On November 5, one day before the Senate was to vote on a war powers resolution. stop and prevent Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the White House counsel held a private briefing with senators on conflicts waged by U.S. armed forces in or against Venezuela.

They assured lawmakers that they would not engage in ground war or air strikes in Venezuela. According to reports, the White House lawyer stated He said that they had no legal justification for such a war. It is clear that blocking the decision was very important to these high-ranking officials. The day after that meeting, the war authorization decision was made. blocked by two votes. Two Republicans joined Democrats and independents in supporting the resolution: Murkowski and Paul. This amounts to 49 votes; This is not quite the majority needed.

However, there were three other Republicans who voted for the new resolution on Thursday, so it will move on to a final vote.

The decision of the war powers is not just a political struggle, but also a matter of life and death. Blockade regarding the seizure of oil tankers, based on illegal use of military force, according to experts. This means that the blockade would be included as participation in hostilities, which would require permission from Congress.

The United States has been imposing unilateral economic sanctions that have destroyed the Venezuelan economy since 2015. From 2012 to 2020, Venezuela experienced the worst peacetime depression in world history. Real (inflation-adjusted) GDP or income fell 74%. Consider the economic devastation of the US Great Depression multiplied by three. Most of these were the result of sanctions.

This unprecedented destruction is often attributed to Maduro in public debates. But U.S. sanctions have deliberately cut Venezuela off from international finance and blocked most oil sales, which account for more than 90% of its foreign exchange (mostly dollars) earnings. This devastated the economy.

Deaths in Venezuela rise in first year of Trump sanctions in 2017-18 tens of thousands People in a period when oil prices are increasing. Sanctions were expanded further the following year. About a quarter of the population, more than 7 million people, emigrated After 2015 — 750,000 From these to the United States.

We know that the deadly impact of sanctions targeting civilians is real. Research published by Lancet Global Health in July by my colleagues Francisco Rodriguez, Silvio Rendon, and me estimates that the global death toll from unilateral economic sanctions is: 564,000 per year in the last decade. This is comparable to deaths from armed conflicts around the world. A. majority In the period 1970-2021, most of the victims were children.

The Trump administration has been moving over the past few days to lift some sanctions to allow oil exports. based on to the president’s stated plan to “govern Venezuela.” This is ironic because Venezuela has been seeking more investment and trade, including oil, with the United States for many years, and it was U.S. sanctions that prohibited this.

This lifting of sanctions would be a major step forward in saving the lives of people in Venezuela who are deprived of food, medicine and other necessities as a result of these sanctions and the economic devastation they have caused.

But we will need to remove military and economic violence from this campaign to achieve the stability from which Venezuela needs to recover. There are members of Congress moving toward this goal, and they need all the help they can get before it’s too late.

Mark Weisbrot is co-director Center for Economic and Policy Research and “the author of that bookFailed: What ‘Experts’ Got Wrong About the Global Economy.”