US President Donald Trump mostly kept Republicans and his America First base on side following the removal of Venezuela’s leader from power.
Though the ouster of Nicolás Maduro is ostensibly a violation of Trump’s pledge to avoid foreign entanglements, few senior conservative lawmakers have criticized the move, thanks in part to a monthslong campaign to quell opposition within the GOP, with even regular critics of the White House holding fire.
Still, the administration may face legislative pressure down the line, while rank-and-file Trump supporters are “bewildered, if not angry,” the former Trump aide Stephen Bannon told The New York Times. On an episode of his podcast, Bannon compared the Venezuela operation to the US “fiasco in Iraq.”