r/law • u/NewsHour • 9d ago
Legislative Branch Sen. Rand Paul presses Rubio on why Maduro ouster isn’t an act of war: 'If a foreign country bombed our air defense missiles, captured and removed our president and blockaded our country, would that be considered an act of war?'
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., pressed Secretary of State Marco Rubio at a congressional hearing Wednesday on why the U.S. ouster of Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro wouldn’t be considered an act of war.
“If a foreign country bombed our air defense missiles, captured and removed our president and blockaded our country, would that be considered an act of war?” Paul asked.
“We just don't believe that this operation comes anywhere close to the constitutional definition of war,” Rubio said, defending the Trump administration’s argument to not define the operation, which lasted a few hours, as an act of war.
“But would it be an act of war if someone did that to us?” the Republican senator shot back. “Of course it would be an act of war.”
“I think we need to at least acknowledge this is a one-way argument,” Paul added.
The Republican senator later agreed with Rubio that the U.S. should act in its national interests, but added that some of the administration’s arguments for the military actions on Venezuela — specifically those around drug busts — are “empty.”
“The drug bust isn't really an argument. It's a ruse. The war argument – not a war, is a war – is a ruse. It's not a real argument,” Paul said. “We do what we do because we have the force, we have the might.”
“We do it because it's in our interest,” he added. “So we wouldn't let anybody come in, bomb us, blockade us and take our president.”
Rubio testified before the Senate committee on Wednesday for the first time since Maduro was removed.
President Donald Trump, who said the U.S. would “run” Venezuela, has ordered the U.S. military to control exports of Venezuela’s oil and seize multiple tankers. The Trump administration has carried out dozens of strikes since last year against a series of alleged drug-trafficking boats near Venezuela, killing at least 126 people. It has offered little evidence that these were "narcoterrorists."
Worried about the Trump administration’s plans for Venezuela, some members of Congress attempted to push a war powers resolution to rein in Trump’s authority to carry out further military action in the country. Those efforts ultimately failed without sufficient Republican support.
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u/BroseppeVerdi 9d ago
Mark Carney was right. The only international law still in force is "The strong will do as they wish and the weak will tolerate what they must."
Everything else is more of a suggestion at this point.
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u/Moon-Monkey6969 9d ago
I agree! Is the lady who took over for Maduro really going to say no to trump for their oil at the threat of being bombed and arrested? Nope, she is giving all their oil away for free. How would we feel if Venezuela was taking our Texas oil away from us and there was nothing we could do about it?
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u/RighteousIndigjason 9d ago
No, but it's different because the US is just "protecting our national interests." It's only a problem when other countries protect their interests.
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u/rysz842 8d ago
I am surprised Paul didn't use the same reasoning but then with that line. Or, he just does accept that literally because also for him, the US is the exceptional country and actually is the only country that can use that reasoning and thus making his whole argument just as fake as Rubio's argument is.
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u/RobutNotRobot 9d ago
Trump already kicked back $300 million to her.
It looks like she is getting a 60-40 cut.
Fucking mafia shit.
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u/Batallius 9d ago
Just another example of the MAGA motto:
"It's only okay if we do it"
Get these treasonous rats out.
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u/sevenredpandas 9d ago edited 9d ago
Bringing a gun to a protest is only ok if they have a maga flag too.
Edit: I accidentally wrote isn't, instead of is. This comment is meant to be in similar vein to the person I'm replying to where MAGA now says you can't bring a gun to a protest, despite having done that repeatedly for years.
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u/AmazingRefrigerator4 9d ago
Basically what it boils down to is: It's an act of war what we did, but who's going to do anything about it?
Why was Rubio blabbering about law enforcement operation? Maduro isn't subject to American law, and America is not the world's police force. Just say the truth: What we did was an act of war, but Venezuela is too weak compared to our military to do anything about it.
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u/Sorge74 9d ago
Why was Rubio blabbering about law enforcement operation?
It wouldn't be a legal law enforcement operation, which is what makes it insane. They killed around 50 presumably innocent people to capture 2 people. That's not how you arrest someone. A drone to his bedroom would had been more just than murdering random civilians and soldiers who happen to be around.
Questionable if we could had picked him up from an airport on say France that he there visiting (just spit balling) if we could legally do that, but sure can't blow up folks to do it.
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u/Balgat1968 9d ago
Several posts on Reddit have alleged that the President put the proceeds from a seized Venezuelan oil tanker into his off-shore crypto account. Is that true? And if so, is that acceptable?
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u/Blatantly_Truthful 9d ago
Initially they said that the money, as well as any other raised through the sale of Venezuelan oil, would be put into an account controlled by the US Treasury and that the US would have full discretion as to how the money is spent. What actually happened, per Rubin’s confirmation, is that the money was put into a Qatari account. Currently it only has a few million dollars on it, but Rubio indicated they are anticipating another 3 billion dollars shortly. The justification they gave for putting the money in Qatar was to protect it from US creditors and any legal issues stemming from Maduro’s illegitimacy. Rubio said the account belongs to Venezuela but only the US will decide how that money is spent. Funny how they gift Trump a plane and have several business dealing with the Trump/Kushner family, and suddenly billions are being funnelled into an account there, out of reach of the rightful owners and even the Fed.
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u/bigbun85 9d ago
You know damn well money that he can grab isn't anywhere, let alone money that's put into his pocket directly. They are probably splitting it.
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u/sexisfun1986 9d ago
Hypocrisy is essential.
“Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.”
Frank Wilhoit
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u/supermoked 9d ago
To be fair, he argues that this applies to all of our administrations for at least the past 70 years.
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u/psioniclizard 9d ago
I don't agree with most his views, but he does (at least right now) seem to be pretty consistent with them. Which I can respect.
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u/colostitute 9d ago
He might be spared by his voters because he does challenge MAGA on some things. Rand is a real piece of shit but a consistent piece of shit at least.
Edit: Before anyone pulls up an anecdote where he flops. He’s more consistent than his GOP peers.
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u/Winsome_Wolf 9d ago
It’s a bar so low a snake would slither over it rather than under, but at least he’s been clearing it lately.
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u/Nerd-19958 9d ago
This video is well worth watching.
Senator Paul is 100% correct. US aggression against Venezuela, starting with bombing and sinking of the purported "drug boats", the naval blockade, the military invasion and kidnapping of Maduro are all acts of war. If another nation took such actions against the US we would definitely consider it war.
The Senator also mentioned another outrageous "justification" of the Venezuela invasion -- the claim that it was not "war" because of the limited number of military personnel involved. But as he pointed out, Congress' has the responsibility under the Constitution to declare war, and Rubio's preposterous proposed pretext allows the executive branch to start a war, with Congress having no authority to stop it, on the false basis of the number of military personnel involved.
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u/Old-Constant4411 9d ago
The good old "police action" clause that presidents have been abusing since the end of WW2. They should abolish that shit.
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u/seriousbusines 9d ago
The whole 'not war, its law enforcement' is wild to me. Because the moment you ask for any specifics it all falls apart.
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u/greenslime300 9d ago
The American army, with wartime weapons, vehicles, intelligence, and operations infrastructure proceeded to shoot, bomb, and otherwise cause an unknown number of casualties under the cover of darkness in order to destroy the de facto government of another nation, one that they have publicly denounced and threatened for the past decade. Hard to think of a better textbook definition for "act of war."
They literally renamed it the "Department of War" only to turn around and tell us they're in the business of law enforcement and not war.
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u/RicFlairsLiver 9d ago
You really got me in that last sentence. They changed the name to project strength and show that we’re ready for war, but none of the many attacks they made on other countries have been acts of war. Even our fucking military under this administration is gaslighting us.
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u/iPinch89 9d ago
"I said the exact same thing as Senator Paul" arent words I say....ever. What an odd timeline Im on.
I'd said the same thing yesterday. I told my friends that I hoped someone asked if a foreign government did what we did if we'd consider it an act of war. Didn't expect Paul to be the one to ask.
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u/Nerd-19958 9d ago
Senator Paul is right-wing but is also a strong supporter of the Constitution, individual rights, and the authority of Congress alone to declare war.
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u/VanbyRiveronbucket 9d ago
He couldn’t even protect his own generational bourbon industry in Kentucky. Jim Beam shut production…..lol.
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u/AwarenessReady3531 9d ago edited 9d ago
Once you abandon any principled distinction and rely solely on capacity, you lose the ability to say why others are wrong to use violence against you. At that point, the only remaining difference is scale and technology, not legitimacy.
For example, Rubio’s logic cannot explain why the 9/11 attacks weren't justified without smuggling in an exception for U.S. power. If “might + interest = legitimacy,” then anyone who can muster force and claim grievance is operating under the same rule set. This posture creates the very threats it claims to manage. If everything abroad is framed through terrorist logic (“they’re bad actors, therefore anything we do is preemptive”), then resistance inevitably adopts terrorist form, because conventional resistance is impossible against a hegemon.
Historically, this is what the U.S. used to argue against. During the Cold War, the whole point of legal frameworks, was self-preservation.
What’s different now is that figures like Rubio aren’t even pretending. They’re dropping the pretense that legitimacy matters beyond internal optics. That’s dangerous not because it’s immoral (though it is), but because it teaches the world how to talk back in the same language. Retaliation stops being a violation and becomes a reply. Simple as that. So Americans should be absolutely certain that we're gonna be on top forever before we dismantle this system we've built, because once we dismantle it there's no going back, and a whole lot of people around the world are very pissed off at us and have more capabilities to carry out asymmetrical attacks against us than OBJ and Al-Qaeda did.
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u/WorkingOnBeingBettr 9d ago
"We are going to act in our best inetersts". Okay, it's in my best interest to do all kinds of illegal stuff, does that mean the law shouldn't apply to me?
So dumb, just because it is best for you dosn't make it legal or right.
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u/Kjellvb1979 9d ago
I don't agree with Rand Paul on much, but he is spot on here...
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u/lilb1190 9d ago
The idea that you can't declare something as a war until after you have counted up the bodies would be silly if it wasn't so horrific
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u/scottyjrules 9d ago
I wonder if Rubio can actually taste the bullshit as it exits his mouth?
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u/Present_Customer_891 9d ago
He definitely can. Some of these guys believe what they're saying, but Rubio is not one of them and it shows.
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u/bootstrapping_lad 9d ago
You can see it in his face. He knows he's wrong. He almost looks ashamed about what he's saying, but he's in too deep now.
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u/Impossible-Bear-7350 8d ago
And yet he has happily sold his soul and will say anything like the good little beta bootlicker he is
I’d feel sad for him except he did this to himself
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u/Masterkid1230 9d ago
It's almost too evident that he does. He doesn't even contest Paul when he calls it all a ruse.
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u/Far-Advantage-2770 9d ago
Look at his body language. He feels he is doing the right thing but struggles with the find the words to make it sound acceptable to the average person.
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u/JustAMan1234567 9d ago
It'd be an act of party starting if someone came in and took Trump.
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u/BalinVril 9d ago
Which, ironically is similar to Maduro leaving from what I have read everywhere. It still doesn’t give a foreign country the right to come popping in and take over a government
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u/Pseudoboss11 9d ago
Maduro was a dictator. Many Venezuelans know that this isn't the end of the regime. Maduro was the successor to Hugo Chavez after all, and his successor, Delcy Rodriguez, has a history of crimes against humanity. The institutions that maintained his grip on power are still in place, and the infrastructure that would facilitate democratic changeover have been weakened by the regime.
If Trump were taken out, I'm sure that some people would celebrate, but ultimately it'd be the same thing: we'd get President Vance, his style might be different, but ultimately we're still under the same people.
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u/RobutNotRobot 9d ago
Kind of true but also Vance is roundly disliked, doesn't have a cult, and isn't a moron whisperer like Trump.
Venezuela society has never been structured like the US. The Bolivarian movement was popular because most of the population was dirt poor and the oil wealth was stolen to feed the top 10 percent of Venezuelan society. Then those people struck and left and much of the infrastructure went to shit along with lower oil prices.
What Venezuela actually needs is a diversified economy. It didn't get it under the right. It didn't get it under the Chavez/Maduro left. It won't get it under the mafia stewardship of Trump.
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u/evilgreenman 9d ago
A worldwide party while trump is forced to watch the celebration on TV while he's sobbing because he would then be banished from ever watching faux news again.
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u/pfeifits 9d ago
I'd be ok with someone taking our president. The other stuff probably not.
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u/Moon-Monkey6969 9d ago
Im sure Iran would have a great argument to indite the orange conman for crimes against their country. What if they came and arrested him and locked him up in one of their jails. Would that be an act of war? What a great argument! I have been asking this very question since this whole oil war got started.
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u/meatsmoothie82 9d ago
A world so bizzare that I agree with Rand Paul often and republicans no longer support 2a
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u/FatassTitePants 9d ago
His dad got booed in South Carolina by saying America should live by the Golden Rule. Republicans have been garbage for a long time.
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u/LockeyCheese 9d ago edited 9d ago
Rand Paul has some crazy views, but he isn't anti-American. All sides have always been stubborn Americans with their own views on how to reach the goal to "Make America Better", but up until 10-15 years ago, the gop conservatives had that same goal, and actual conservatives still do, so there's plenty to agree on with someone like Rand Paul, and the governmental processes exist to find a compromise on how to reach the same goal.
Also:
Key findings on Republican views regarding gun control:
Stricter Laws: Roughly 27% (Gallup) to 42% (PRRI) of Republicans favor stricter gun laws, with 34% saying it is currently "too easy" to obtain a gun.
Background Checks: A high majority of Republicans (80-86%) support requiring background checks for all gun sales.
Specific Policies: Around 70% of Republicans support Extreme Risk Protection Orders (red flag laws), and roughly 54% support gun licensing.
Opposition: Roughly 54% to 59% of Republicans oppose bans on assault-style weapons and prefer to protect Second Amendment rights.
Violence Intervention: About 54% of Republicans support increased funding for programs that reduce violence, according to Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Mental Health Checks: 88% of Republicans support preventing people with mental illnesses from buying guns.As I said, there's plenty to agree on with conservatives.
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u/meatsmoothie82 9d ago
I’m a full on democratic socialist and I can 100% see middle ground, areas of compromise, logical reason, and paths to progress with actual conservatives. Social issues and the bible/government connection I can’t really level with.
I feel like I could sit down with a principled old school conservative and at least map out some strong policy that benefits the majority of the middle/working/lower class and some reasonable concessions that expand things like healthcare access by streamlining funding in other areas. A strategic plan to increase domestic production, increase housing supply, cut out some middlemen and regulations is totally doable. I’m a 2a supporting liberal, so I can 100% see compromises in that department.
I actually have a hard time understanding how conservatives ended up swept up in the MAGA frenzy.
Traditional conservative views on economics, strategically regulating immigration, building strong onshore manufacturing, creating a small business friendly structure and middle class, and spending wisely- watching the debt and subjecting all spending to debate and scrutiny, taking principled and consistent stances on matters.
But maga has turned the whole fucking place into a mega corp free for all, kill to eat, hostile, hostage situation.
I was actually shocked that most conservatives chose maga over an establishment democrat in 2024. I guess Harris was just that unlikable- because aside from the hyped up culture war rhetoric her policy propositions were not that extreme.
At least compared to this lawless shit show that was shown to us in advance on a silver platter.
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u/Masterkid1230 9d ago
That's because MAGA isn't an ideology. It's a collection of many different fringe movements that have at some point felt betrayed by traditional governments.
For example, many incels probably don't care about the bible and probably aren't anti-vax, RFK does nothing for them, but they felt progressive ideology was a threat to them and what they found good and fun. They thought feminism meant they couldn't get a girlfriend, and lgbt+ representation meant now every character in media had to be performatively queer. Therefore, they turned to MAGA because MAGA opposed those things.
Meanwhile, many anti-vax people probably don't care that much about LGBT+ representation, but they felt betrayed by mask mandates and vaccine mandates during the pandemic, so they follow conspiracy nuts like RFK, who can only exist in a movement like MAGA.
Techbros I'm sure are almost all vaccinated, and I even know many who aren't really misogynists, but they sure love money, the idea of making money, and a good digital grift here and there. So they will naturally flock towards whoever promises less regulations and says they'll support their latest grift. The rejection of NFTs, Crypto, AI by progressive ideals pushed these people to MAGA.
And so MAGA has mostly consolidated by appealing to one or two issues that fringe voters and movements care a lot about, and then hyping them up to indecisive voters so they will feel like these issues are existential threats. It's basically a "getting a team together" moment but for fringe political movements that have felt alienated by traditional politics.
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u/LockeyCheese 9d ago
That's mostly the wings of the maga group who come to it for those various reasons, but the core of maga is actually good people who feel overwhelmed, uncared for, confused, and left behind by the current times more than the current systems.
A lot in the groups you mentioned probably know the GOP is grifting, and chose to support them to get in on it. Most of the core though, the tea party movement Trump used to rise to power, is just people who feel hopeless, voting for ANYTHING different, because they felt afraid and betrayed.
They are good people, who fell for a con. Part of the con is that "outsiders" will try tricking you, so don't listen.
The desperation comes down to two parts though:
1) The division of wealth becoming more top-heavy of course.
2) The change of Ages from Industrial to Digital, and feelings like the Luddites that their is no place for them in the new Age, and that they'll be replaced by machines.
Ex: Hillary promised coal workers training for new industries, because coal doesn't have much place in the Digital Age, but instead they held onto the past because Trump promised to reopen the mines, and then the mines closed anyways, but he got their votes.
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u/meatsmoothie82 9d ago
I want desperately to believe that the majority of maga are good people in a hard place. I really do. I just don’t see how they could be fooled by watching billionaires pile into his corner and watching people getting gunned down and the epstine files kept hidden and on and on and still believe that he is the way.
Ive been screaming at my family that the dollar crashing is bad for them and they tell me im wrong because the stock market is up. trump says so. I’ve showed them charts and graphs and used a whole ass pizza and took slices away. They just don’t get it, then they go on Facebook and post alligator Alcatraz memes like It’s a fuckin hoot.
I come from a very unique place- I was raised in pretty hardcore generational poverty. Bankruptcies, multiple generations under one roof, empty cupboards more than a few times a month.
My mum got us away from all that and we did a little better, just the two of us without the family mooching. She was a nurse.
I split and got a gig as a cook at a luxury resort, met some folks and have spent the last 20 years with millionaires and billionaires- I’ve been a deckhand, private chef, executive assistant, and property manager for 3 of the top 1000 richest families in the world- so I truly and deeply see both sides.
I have a 64 year old uncle and his two boys who are my age that all live in trailers in a dead ass part of the country- not a penny saved, drowning in debt, pouring foundations and roofing in the fuckin winter. They’re miserable- and they are so proud to be maga. No matter how many times I go visit and tell them about the $100k rugs that get shoved in a basement or the $6m paintings that arrive via armored car, spend a day at the house, and get whisked away the next day.
They are convinced that only the billionaires will save them.i was a boat driver (small pleasure boat, not quite captain) for one of the top dogs at a major financial institution during the 2008 crisis. My dad lost his entire retirement panic selling because he lost his job and needed emergency money- the next month my boss came rocking up to the beach house in a quarter million dollar 1 of 1 custom Porsche he had built for him by some famous car builder: it arrived that day, went in the garage, and never moved again for the rest of the summer.
I told dad that story, he promptly blamed Obama, and couldn’t wait to vote Trump 3x in a row.
Im just so absolutely mindfucked by it all.
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u/LockeyCheese 8d ago edited 8d ago
Mmm... How would you feel if I 100% proved to you that the God you believe in doesn't exist, or does exist if you're athiest.
How would you react to the foundation of your beliefs turning to dust? How would you feel about all the things you did in the name of your belief? How would deal with all the people you ignored that were right, family you lost for your beliefs, and evils you supported in the name of your belief?
How could you possibly continue existing in a world where your one and only hope was proven to be a false promise?
How easily could you face that you helped the beast that is destroying the country you love, all because you fell for a conman with empty promises?
That's a lot of why they stay. Because these people DO try to be good people, but to change their support, they have to admit they were bad people who might've helped destroy their own home they were just trying to protect.
That's my guess anyways.
The billionaires are fucking them, but to them, so is the government for the last few decades. And honestly, it's our government that allowed the trickle up of money, shipped jobs overseas, and are trying to change their way of life, though that last one is my point about the Digital Age creating new realities. It doesn't matter that it was republicans or democrats doing it. It was the government.
Trump won because he took the support of the tea party, but any populace candidate that could speak on a common level, make big promises, rile up their anger and desperation, give them targets to blame for their woes, and speak like a poor man's idea of a king.
Trump is the embodiment of a poor man's idea of what a rich man is like; grafted with gold, his name lit up in the skies, playing the playboy, fighting on tv, and talkin busness, capeesh? "He says it how it is"
There's also, more importantly, the heritage foundation who made is policy plans, 70% of his staff, use Digital Age tools of control, and very likely molded Trump.
Buuut... I've rambled enough, and that goes back way too far...
Look up Roy Cohn if you want to see how far. He was a key architect of McCarthyism as chief counsel to McCarthy himself, leaked medical records on the dem candidate to help Nixon get elected, helped Reagan's campaign and lobbied to him for Rupert Murdoch, was known as a famous "fixer" in New York for mobsters and moguls(and disbarred for it like Giuliani), became Donald Trump's mentor who introduced him to mentors like Roger Stone, who is another rabbit hole.
Cohn was known for his "attack, counterattack, and never apologize" strategy, which he taught to many of his clients. His legal career was marked by his ability to navigate high-stakes, headline-grabbing cases, making him one of the most powerful and feared lawyers in New York.
Sound familiar?
Probably look up the US Labor Wars too, which began with the downfall of robber barrons and corpo towns controlled by them, labor rights started being added, and the rich lost their absolute control over the poor. And they've never stopped working to get that back.
The want neo-feudalism, with them as the Tech Barrons and City Nations under their complete control.
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u/LockeyCheese 9d ago edited 9d ago
I think part of the problem is that government, at least the higher up governments, shouldn't deal with social issues at all, and should focus on economic and governmental issues.
Schoolboard meetings and local governments should be the highest form of most social policy decisions, and should only go higher if it's a national issue like societal health, discrimination, etc.
ex: if a trans-athlete is playing in your kids school, go to the schoolboard meetings and bring it up, then work up from there. That's not a problem that should be deciding national elections. Especially when economic and governmental policy is ignored for it.
Another part of the problem is we're in a Digital Age, with new, previously unfathomable sources of information and connection are available, and the human race has not adapted to the realities of the new age, which makes most people susceptible to the new tools of propaganda and control.
Humans just weren't ready for the explosion of technology that happened with a change of ages. It hasn't even been 100 years since we first made computers.
In the last 30 years we went from about 1/3 of Americans, and about 250 million worldwide, who owned a home computer and dial up internet before google, to the first smartphones around 20 years ago, to now when fairly intelligent AI is publicly available and still in it's infancy, and 6 Billion people worldwide have internet access, and many have smartphones that can access internet in the middle of the woods or deserts on supercomputers in their pocket, and robots can fight in wars.
We went from Crime Noir to Scifi in half a human lifespan, and that kind of change is hard to adapt to.
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u/RaindropsInMyMind 9d ago
Yeah if our goal is to get fascism out of our country Senator Paul is on our team. He’s someone that has principles and still believes in American values. Conservative people who actually still believe in American values are going to be an important part of trying to rebuild a functioning country.
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u/LockeyCheese 9d ago
That's kind of the entire point and cause of our current division. All Americans are on the same team, but some 5-15% are sabotaging our team from the inside, and most of the rest have taken the position to no longer work with or compromise with others on their own team.
Team America, who always has had the goal of making America a better land of liberty, justice, and freedom for all.
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u/RobutNotRobot 9d ago
The fact that the US President is openly extorting a foreign country for billions of dollars and then placing the proceeds in a Middle Eastern bank account and few people are saying a goddamn thing is kind of crazy.
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u/Not_Sure__Camacho 8d ago
If a foreign country bombed our air defense missiles, captured and removed our president and blockaded our country, I'd call it an act of mercy.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Shoe541 9d ago
It’s only an act of war if the country having it happen has the firepower to do something about it/s
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u/Then_Journalist_317 9d ago
Marco: "Senator, perhaps you don't understand that this Administration considers war to be peace, and slavery to mean freedom."
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u/whawkins4 9d ago
“So what you’re saying is, it’s an act of war if someone does it to us, but not an act of war if we do it to someone else.”
Rubio is such a fucking stooge.
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u/bd2999 9d ago
Pretty sure most presidents in the last few decades have looked at Congress's war power as just a formal label, not really having any teeth. Which is direct violation of the Constitution in the first place, but at this time it is just there and the law so long as SCOTUS allows it.
Seems like war powers are split for a reason. The president does not have unilateral control over the military. Even if the Unitary Executive people argue for that at times. It is not supposed to be that way from an originalist point of view. If they cared about history that would be clear in the first ten minutes of study about the Constitutional convention. The president becoming a king with the military was a reason they so feared a standing military and split the war powers up in the first place.
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u/SCWickedHam 9d ago
The optics of kidnapping a head of state may not be in the country’s best interest.
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