Even after Maduro’s capture, Democrats try to keep their focus on affordability

(CNN) — Democrats are grappling with how best to respond to the Trump administration’s military intervention in Venezuela, as the operation to capture Nicolás Maduro highlighted foreign policy differences within the party and distracted from its focus on affordability issues.

Maduro’s capture has forced Democrats to consider how much to criticize the way the Trump administration deposed the Venezuelan president, even if many are glad to see him out of office.

Many Democrats in Congress have ripped President Donald Trump for conducting the raid without notifying lawmakers while also criticizing Maduro, who has long drawn bipartisan condemnation.

“The Constitution isn’t a matter of inconvenience. It’s a requirement,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Monday. “There is no Trump exception to the United States Constitution.”

The Senate is expected this week to vote on a resolution to limit Trump’s war powers against Venezuela amid his administration’s lethal strikes on alleged drug boats.

Several Democrats have sought to tie the Venezuela operation to health care costs and other cost-of-living concerns, arguing that Trump is more focused on foreign affairs than domestic policy after campaigning against wars abroad.

“Do we want to start more regime change, oil-focused wars, or do we actually want healthcare for the American people?” Rep. Patrick Ryan, a New York Democrat and Army combat veteran, told CNN’s Dana Bash on Monday. “That’s the choice that was just made with no consultation by the people or the Congress on January 3 that many of us woke up to that morning.”

Potential 2028 presidential candidates have focused on the expiration of enhanced premium tax credits for Affordable Care Act plans on January 1, which has led to millions of Americans facing higher health care costs. But they’ve also sought to stress their opposition to Maduro.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said in an interview with a local radio station that Maduro is “bad guy” who stole elections, oppressed his people and had allied himself with US adversaries. But Shapiro also raised concerns about the amount of work that needs to be done domestically.

“We are seeing thousands of people drop their health care coverage here in Pennsylvania,” Shapiro said. “The idea that we’re going to go get entangled in foreign wars instead of fixing the problems here at home, that’s my biggest beef with this.”

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker wrote on X that Americans “deserve a President focused on making their lives more affordable.”

New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who has been floated as a potential future presidential candidate, wrote on X that the Maduro trial was meant to “distract from Epstein + skyrocketing healthcare costs,” a reference to the release of Department of Justice files on the disgraced late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Democrats, particularly veterans, have pointed to Trump’s frequent references to Venezuela’s oil supplies to draw parallels to the US invasion of Iraq and raise fears about another deadly and costly “forever war.”

Americans were closely split in their initial reactions to the US military operation that captured Maduro, according to a Washington Post poll conducted over the weekend.

In that poll, 40% of US adults approved of the US having sent military forces into Venezuela to capture Maduro, with 42% disapproving and 18% unsure.

A 63% majority said that the operation should have required approval from Congress, with 37% saying it was appropriate for President Trump to order it on his own.

For Democrats, making a domestic policy case may be easier than asserting themselves on the foreign policy front.

Joel Rubin, a Democratic strategist and former deputy assistant secretary of state under former President Barack Obama, said Trump had wasted an opportunity to gain bipartisan consensus on Maduro’s ouster by side-stepping Congress and had failed to clearly message on what comes next. But he urged potential Democratic presidential candidates to not “pander to the base.”

“If you’re a serious candidate, you’re actually going to try to explain why it’s in the broader American national security interest to get this right,” he said. “Will this be a determinant on the vote? Probably not, but it definitely will be a determinant on the perception of their seriousness as a leader.”

The weekend’s military action has highlighted one of the main challenges that has faced Democrats’ during the president’s first year back in office: serving as a check on executive power while in the minority.

“This has been part of the problem with the Democrats’ response to Trump in general,” said Matt Duss, the executive vice president at the Center for International Policy and a former adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders, who called the operation illegal. “Their actions don’t reflect their words when it comes to the alarm they’re trying to sound. They need to start acting like they really believe this is a crisis.”

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