President Donald Trump said Saturday that U.S. forces carried out a “large-scale strike” in and around Caracas and “captured” Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, flying them out of the country. If confirmed in full, the operation would mark one of the most dramatic U.S. military actions in the Western Hemisphere in decades—instantly triggering questions about legality, oversight, and motive, especially because Congress has not authorized a war with Venezuela.
The first issue is constitutional: in the U.S. system, Congress holds the power to declare war, while presidents serve as commander-in-chief and can respond to emergencies. That line has been blurred for generations, but the basic principle remains that sustained hostilities are supposed to involve Congress’s “collective judgment,” not just the White House. The War Powers Resolution—passed after Vietnam—was designed to force presidents to notify Congress quickly and to limit how long U.S. forces can remain in hostilities without legislative approval. A raid-and-strike campaign aimed at capturing a foreign head of state looks less like a narrow rescue mission and more like a step toward open conflict, particularly if it invites retaliation, escalatory cycles, or a longer U.S. military presence.
That’s what makes the “no vote, no authorization” angle so important. Even if the administration frames the operation as counterterrorism or counternarcotics rather than “war,” the practical effect may be indistinguishable from war to Americans and Venezuelans alike: explosions in a capital, attacks on military sites, and the forcible removal of a sitting president. The legal debate won’t hinge on what the White House calls it, but on whether U.S. forces were introduced into hostilities—and whether Congress was meaningfully consulted before the trigger was pulled.
The second issue is consistency. The administration has argued that its aggressive actions are part of a “war on drugs” and a campaign against “narco-terrorism,” with Maduro long accused by U.S. officials of ties to trafficking networks. But critics point to a glaring contradiction: in December 2025, Trump pardoned former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, who had been convicted in the United States on drug-trafficking charges and sentenced to decades in prison. That pardon has fueled allegations that the “war on drugs” rhetoric is being applied selectively—punishing geopolitical enemies while granting mercy to politically convenient figures.
That selectivity matters because it shapes public trust. If the stated justification is stopping narcotics, yet a high-profile convicted trafficker is pardoned, people naturally ask whether counternarcotics policy is being used as a political weapon rather than a principle. And when the tool being used is military force—especially force not clearly authorized by Congress—the risk is not just inconsistency, but perceived abuse of power.
The third issue is oil—and the suspicion that resource politics is sitting close to the center of this conflict. Trump and senior figures around him have repeatedly framed Venezuela through the lens of oil wealth and “rights” that the U.S. supposedly lost. In December, Trump publicly demanded Venezuela return “oil rights” and said “we want it back,” language that critics say sounds less like sanctions enforcement and more like a claim over another nation’s resources. Venezuela’s government has already accused Washington of acting to seize control of its oil and mineral wealth—an accusation that lands differently when the U.S. president has a documented record of talking about other countries’ oil as a strategic prize.
Even if no U.S. company is directly promised anything, oil markets and oil-linked interests can still benefit from heightened confrontation. News of blockade policies and military escalation has moved prices, and tighter Venezuelan supply can reshape trade flows—creating winners among producers, shippers, traders, and firms positioned to gain if sanctions carve out special exemptions. Reporting has highlighted that Chevron remains a notable U.S. exception with a foothold in Venezuela under licensing arrangements, putting a major American corporate actor at the center of any future “deal” architecture. That doesn’t prove corruption—but it does create a structural conflict-of-interest concern: when policy is built around squeezing a petrostate, private-sector players with the right access can profit from the squeeze.
Finally, there’s the broader danger to Americans: normalization. If a president can order a major strike and the capture of a foreign leader without a clear congressional mandate, the precedent doesn’t stay overseas. It conditions the public to accept unilateral executive action as standard, even when the stakes include retaliation, cyberattacks, energy shocks, immigration surges, or U.S. personnel and civilians becoming targets. The War Powers framework exists because the costs of war—blood, money, and blowback—don’t belong to one person or one branch of government. They belong to the country.
This is why the question isn’t only what happened in Caracas. The bigger question is whether the United States is sliding toward a model where “because the president says so” becomes the operative legal standard. In a democracy, that’s not strength—it’s drift. And drift, in foreign policy, is how disasters start.
Sources (for reference)
- CBS News live updates on U.S. strikes and Trump’s claim Maduro and Flores were captured (Jan. 3, 2026). CBS News
- Reuters on strikes/noises in Caracas and Trump’s statement about Maduro being taken away (Jan. 3, 2026). Reuters
- The Guardian reporting Trump’s capture claim and Venezuelan response (Jan. 3, 2026). The Guardian
- U.S. Congress (CRS) explainer on Trump’s pardon of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández (updated Dec. 8, 2025). Congress.gov
- FactCheck.org review of the Hernández pardon and Trump’s rationale (Dec. 2025). FactCheck.org
- Constitution Annotated (Congress) on Congress’s declare war power (Article I). Congress.gov
- CRS on the War Powers Resolution and how it is interpreted/applied (Dec. 17, 2025). Congress.gov
- PBS NewsHour video of Trump demanding Venezuela return “oil rights” / “we want it back” (Dec. 17, 2025). PBS
- Washington Post background on Venezuela oil nationalization and the dispute over “stolen” oil claims (Dec. 2025). The Washington Post
- Reuters on Trump ordering a blockade of sanctioned oil tankers and market reaction (Dec. 2025). Reuters
