President Donald Trump says that he is going to inform Congress of his plan to carry out military strikes on cartels in Venezuela. 

Trump, according to the New York Post, revealed as much on Thursday, when speaking to reporters at the White House.

This is all part of the Trump administration's effort to crack down on drug-smuggling cartels.

JUST IN: 🇺🇸 President #Trump says "we're just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country."

Is this extrajudiciall killing? pic.twitter.com/8U3osZavnn

— Commentary: Trump Truth Social Posts On X (@TrumpTruthOnX) October 23, 2025

"We're going to Congress..."

The Post reports Trump as saying that he and his administration are going to go to Congress with their plan to attack Venezuela.

Per the outlet:

“We’re going to go [to Congress]. I don’t see any loss in going — no reason not to,” Trump told reporters at a White House event touting a federal crackdown that’s arrested roughly 3,200 alleged drug cartel members over the past month. “You know they will always complain, ‘Oh, we should have gone.’ So we’re going to definitely,” Trump said. The president turned to Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, seated to his right, and told him, “I’d like to just tell you, ‘Let’s go.’ We’ll go. We’re going to tell them what we’re going to do, and I think they’re going to probably like it, except for the radical left lunatics.”

The president is probably right about this. There are some on the political right, though, who may also oppose the move.

U.S. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), for example, has been one of the most vocal Republicans in Congress in opposing the strikes that the Trump administration has been carrying out in the southern seas.

Just recently, for example, Paul argued:

We don’t blow up boats off Miami because 25% of the time suspicion is wrong. We shouldn’t do it off Venezuela either. These are small outboards with no fentanyl and no path to Florida. We can’t just kill indiscriminately because we are not at war. It’s summary execution!  Everyone gets a trial because sometimes, the system gets it wrong. Even the worst of the worst in our country get due process. The bottom line is that execution without process is not justice, and blowing up foreign ships is a recipe for chaos.

Background

The Venezuelan cartels are among those that the Trump administration has been cracking down on.

Recent reports revealed that Trump sent the elite military unit known as the "Night Stalkers" to the country.

The New York Post reported:  

An elite Army unit capable of inserting some of the American military’s most deadly special operations forces into a fight has been deployed to the Caribbean as President Trump exerts an increasing show of force in Venezuela. The 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, known as the vaunted “Night Stalkers,” operates attack helicopters like the Army’s MH-60 Black Hawks and small transport helicopters into the most perilous situations.

The Daily Mail has revealed that "Trump has deployed B-52 nuclear bombers, guided missile destroyers, F-35B fighter jets, P-8 Poseidon spy planes, a nuclear submarine and around 6,500 troops."

As all of this was happening, many in Congress argued that Trump needs their permission to proceed. There is little doubt that Trump is now saying that he is going to go to Congress with his plans as an attempt at appeasing those dissenting voices.