Sen. Chris Coons says Donald Trump is inching the U.S. dangerously close to conflict with Venezuela, saying on “Morning Joe” that the president would be wise to take an “off-ramp” and enter negotiations with the country before it’s too late.
The Delaware Democrat told MS NOW’s Jonathan Lemire that despite Trump’s “America First” campaign rhetoric, as president, he has done the exact opposite. “Trump ran on lowering your costs, making America healthy again and avoiding stupid new wars overseas,” the senator said. “He’s failing on all three.”
As the administration continues to carry out strikes against alleged drug boats off the coast of Venezuela, Coons warned that Trump is “sleepwalking without a clear policy, or a clear path forward, into a conflict with one of our hemisphere’s most capable authoritarian regimes.”
Questioning the president’s true motives in the region, the senator said: “Is this about access to oil? That is something President Trump’s talked about, and his chief of staff, Susie Wiles, admitted in a Vanity Fair article that, frankly, this is about regime change.”
He noted that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has told the U.S. he’s open to negotiations to tamp down on drug trafficking, and he urged the president to accept the olive branch. “This might be the off-ramp that Trump needs,” he said.
Coons, who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also spoke about Trump’s recent social media posts regarding Iran. In a post on Truth Social early Friday, Trump said the U.S would intervene if the Iranian government used deadly force against its citizens, amid widespread demonstrations in the country. “We are locked and loaded and ready to go,” Trump wrote.
“One of the most unsettling and dangerous things that President Trump does is these unhinged tweets at 3 a.m.,” Coons told Lemire.
He added: “If you were responsible for leading the U.S. military and implementing directives from our commander in chief, what would you conclude from that tweet that we are ‘locked and loaded and ready to go’ to support Iran’s protesters?”
While Coons acknowledged he thought it was “appropriate to put more pressure on Iran’s regime” in support of the protesters, he said he thought that promising military action would appear as “another empty threat” to leaders around the world, similar to Trump’s “threats to take over Greenland or Panama or Canada.”
“And it frankly means that leaders around the world are either laughing at us or scared by what he’s going to tweet next at 3 a.m. tonight,” he added.
You can watch Coons’ full interview on “Morning Joe” in the clip at the top of the page.
Allison Detzel is an editor/producer for MS NOW.