Potential 2028 Democratic presidential candidates lined up Sunday to denounce President Donald Trump’s surprise military operation in Venezuela that resulted in the capture of President Nicolás Maduro, characterizing the congressionally unauthorized strike as an unconstitutional distraction from domestic failures and economic woes.
The sharp rebukes — coming from figures including Vice President Kamala Harris, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and several senators and governors — signal how Venezuela could become a flashpoint in the 2028 campaign, with Democrats seizing on what they describe as an unnecessary and unjustified military intervention.
“It’s not about drugs. If it was, Trump wouldn’t have pardoned one of the largest narco traffickers in the world last month,” said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., referencing former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who Trump recently pardoned despite a jury convicting him for trafficking cocaine. “It’s about oil and regime change. And they need a trial now to pretend that it isn’t. Especially to distract from Epstein + skyrocketing healthcare costs.”
Harris called the operation “unlawful and unwise,” even as she acknowledged Maduro is “a brutal, illegitimate dictator.”
“We’ve seen this movie before,” the former vice president said. “Wars for regime change or oil that are sold as strength but turn into chaos, and American families pay the price. The American people do not want this, and they are tired of being lied to.”
Buttigieg invoked Trump’s “America First” rhetoric, calling the intervention “an old and obvious pattern: An unpopular president — failing on the economy and losing his grip on power at home — decides to launch a war for regime change abroad. The American people don’t want to ‘run’ a foreign country while our leaders fail to improve life in this one.”
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker echoed the economic critique, posting on X that the “American people deserve a president focused on making their lives more affordable.”
Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., extended blame to congressional Republicans, accusing them of “spineless complicity” in failing to check a president “who repeatedly violates his oath, disregards the law, and endangers American interests at home and abroad.”
“From the reckless leaking of classified information that put American troops at risk, to the illegal use of military force destroying vessels and killing people in the Caribbean and the Pacific without congressional authorization, there has been a stunning absence of accountability,” Booker said.
Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly condemned Maduro as an illegitimate leader, but said Trump “doesn’t understand the risks and costs involved with these poorly thought-out decisions that don’t make Americans any safer today than they were yesterday.” He also called on Congress to vote this week to prevent Trump from taking further unilateral action in Venezuela.
“I want the people of Venezuela to be free to choose their own future, but if we learned anything from the Iraq war, it’s that dropping bombs or toppling a leader doesn’t guarantee democracy, stability or make Americans safer,” Kelly said. “More often, it leads to chaos or drags the U.S. into a war and lengthy occupation.”
There were also some jabs thrown at fellow Democrats — even obliquely. Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., slammed “the silence from many media-hyped 2028 contenders,” though declined to single out who he was referring to. “If you cannot oppose this regime change war for oil, you don’t have the moral clarity or guts to lead our party or nation.”
Erum Salam is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW, with a focus on how global events and foreign policy shape U.S. politics. She previously was a breaking news reporter for The Guardian.