Tensions are high among some members of Congress following a briefing from a top administration lawyer, who indicated that the Trump administration does not plan to comply with the War Powers Resolution. This decision relates to the ongoing campaign against Venezuelan drug cartels. As reported by the Washington Post, T. Elliot Gaiser, who leads the Trump administration’s Office of Legal Counsel, stated that the administration does not classify these strikes as hostilities under the law. Consequently, they do not intend to request an extension of the deadline or seek congressional approval for the continuation of these actions.

Reactions were swift. “The administration seems to be ignoring the 60-day limit,” remarked a senior congressional aide, reflecting the frustration among legislators.

Finucane’s identity remains a mystery, though he appears to carry a sense of self-importance.

• Brian Finucane, former legal adviser to the State Department and now senior adviser for the U.S. program at the International Crisis Group. “It’s a wild claim of executive authority.”

Not wanting to be left out, some less influential Republicans joined the debate.

• “In any normal administration, somebody would be fired for this kind of abuse,” said Virginia Sen. Mark R. Warner, the ranking member on the Senate Intelligence Committee.

• “The administration is, I believe, doing an illegal act and anything that it can to avoid Congress,” said New York Rep. Gregory W. Meeks, the ranking member on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, 

• “The last word that I gave to the admiral [that would be Rear Admiral Brian Bennett, the Navy’s Deputy Director for Special Warfare] is I hope you recognize the constitutional peril that you are in, and the peril you are putting our troops in,” threatened Massachusetts Democrat Seth Moulton, who is of no significance.

To clarify, the War Powers Resolution is often criticized for its ineffectiveness. It is considered by some to be constitutionally flawed, assuming Congress holds ultimate authority over the armed forces. It states that “The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by an attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.” This premise has been challenged since the days of President George Washington, who deployed the U.S. Army under Lieutenant Colonel Josiah Harmer to drive Native Americans out of the Northwest Territories without congressional approval.

Sen. Roger Wicker (Mississippi), the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, joined in a rare bipartisan rebuke the same day. He and his Democratic counterpart, Sen. Jack Reed (Rhode Island), made public two letters they both had sent to the Pentagon weeks before, requesting legal documents, attack orders and a list of targets. The Defense Department, they wrote, had exceeded the amount of time required by law to provide some of the materials.

Let’s be clear. The War Powers Resolution is a joke. It is facially unconstitutional from its premise that Congress is the super-duper commander-in-chief of the armed forces when it claims “The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.” That has not been true since President George Washington sent the U.S. Army and Lieutenant Colonel Josiah Harmer to run the Indians out of the Northwest Territories.

The law was imposed on a scandal-weakened Richard Nixon, and since that time, both presidents and Congress have pretended it has the force of law. A president has invoked it on only one occasion. President Gerald Ford did so on May 15, 1975, in conjunction with the SS Mayaguez Incident, and the subsequent U.S. Marines assaulted Koh Tang Island. It was not complied with for the invasions of Grenada and Panama, or the intervention in Yugoslavia.

Congress has used the War Powers Resolution twice to force an end to combat. Both times, the president was very happy to go along with the fiction that Congress had ended the conflict. The first time was the end of U.S. involvement under President Reagan in Lebanon in 1983. Reagan signed the War Powers Resolution limiting U.S. involvement to 18 months, but he did so saying, “while he agreed with the resolution to authorize force, he could not ‘cede any of the authority vested in me under the Constitution as President and as Commander in Chief of United States Armed Forces’.” 

The second time was getting Bill Clinton out of Somalia in 1995. Notably, in conjunction wth Clinton sending troops to Haiti, he said, “[l]ike my predecessors of both parties, I have not agreed that I was constitutionally mandated to get” congressional approval for a military action.

Congress tried to use the War Powers Resolution to force President Trump to end involvement in Yemen and Iran; President Trump vetoed both resolutions (here | here).

The bottom line here is that presidents of all parties have ignored the War Powers Resolution except when it was politically advantageous to pay attention to it. Trump stiff-arming his political enemies is not the same as breaking an unenforceable law. The War Powers Resolution isn’t used because it is virtually impossible to force a president who opposes it to go along with it. The commander-in-chief does not answer to Congress on military operations. If Congress objects, then it can stop funding the operation. Finally, the War Powers Resolution is blatantly, facially unconstitutional. Everyone knows that, and the reason no one in Congress has ever sued to have it enforced is that they know how that movie ends. 

Given everything about the issue, one really wonders why the Democrats are going after Trump so hard to leave the drug cartels alone when, by all accounts, it is overwhelmingly popular. I mean, unless money was involved somehow.

Poll: 71% of Americans support Trump’s strikes on boats smuggling drugs https://t.co/UDOT20FyCM

— John Solomon (@jsolomonReports) October 10, 2025

On this issue, I think President Trump is right on two major points. First, there are no “imminent hostilities.” Second, the law does not imagine a conflict taking place in international waters:

1) into hostilities or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances;

(2) into the territory, airspace or waters of a foreign nation, while equipped for combat, except for deployments which relate solely to supply, replacement, repair, or training of such forces; or

(3) in numbers which substantially enlarge United States Armed Forces equipped for combat already located in a foreign nation;

If any of the people whinging about this subject are that upset, they can introduce a resolution, pass it through both the Senate and the House, have President Trump veto it, and then override his veto. The last thing President Trump should do is cede any executive power to this collection of nincompoops who really don’t care if Americans get killed, but they care a great deal about damaging President Trump.

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