The Senate Just Used the Defense Bill to Put the Pentagon on a Leash and Pete Hegseth Is the Test Case

By Brian Allen

The Senate has passed a $901 billion defense authorization bill, but buried inside the routine machinery of military funding is something far less routine: a direct congressional pressure campaign against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over U.S. strikes near Venezuela.

This is not about budget numbers. It is about oversight, war powers, and whether the Pentagon can conduct lethal operations abroad without fully accounting to Congress.

What happened

On Wednesday, the Senate approved the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) by a 77–20 vote. The bill authorizes $901 billion in defense spending and raises troop pay by 3.8 percent. The White House has signaled the bill aligns broadly with President Trump’s national security priorities .

But the legislation also includes a targeted provision aimed squarely at Hegseth: it threatens to withhold 25 percent of the defense secretary’s travel budget unless he provides Congress with unedited video footage and authorizing orders from U.S. strikes on alleged drug boats in international waters near Venezuela.

That is not symbolic language. It is financial leverage.

Why Congress is demanding the video

Lawmakers are investigating a September 2 strike that killed two people who had survived an initial attack on their boat. According to reporting, the strike amounted to a so-called “double-tap” — a second strike following an initial engagement — raising serious legal and ethical questions under U.S. rules of engagement and international law .

As detailed in the AP report, Admiral Frank “Mitch” Bradley, who ordered the strike, briefed lawmakers in a classified setting and showed them video of the incident. However, many members of Congress say they still lack sufficient information, and some are calling for partial public release of the footage.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said plainly: “The American people absolutely need to see this video. I think they would be shocked” .

A rare bipartisan rebuke

What makes this moment significant is not Democratic opposition alone. Republicans and Democrats jointly agreed to the budgetary penalty language.

While many GOP lawmakers continue to defend the anti-narcotics campaign in the Caribbean, the decision to condition Hegseth’s travel budget reflects a bipartisan conclusion that the Pentagon has failed to brief Congress adequately.

That is a line Congress does not draw lightly, especially in a defense bill that also:

• Locks in U.S. troop levels in Europe and South Korea

• Sends additional weapons manufacturing funds to support Ukraine

• Repeals decades-old war authorizations from Iraq and the Gulf War

• Expands congressional notification requirements for major military decisions

Taken together, the bill reads less like a blank check and more like a reclaiming of institutional authority.

Venezuela and the war powers problem

The strikes near Venezuela sit at the center of a larger constitutional issue.

The Trump administration has increasingly reoriented military focus toward Central and South America, while stepping back from Europe. Yet Congress has not authorized hostilities against Venezuela, nor approved a standing campaign involving lethal force in international waters near its borders.

The NDAA explicitly rejected efforts to limit Trump’s ability to attack Venezuela, but simultaneously tightened oversight mechanisms — a contradiction that reveals how uneasy lawmakers are with the trajectory of executive power.

In effect, Congress is saying: we will fund you, but we will also watch you.

Why this matters beyond Hegseth

Pete Hegseth is not just defending a single strike. He is defending a theory of executive authority in which:

• Lethal force can be deployed far from declared battlefields

• Congress is briefed selectively, after the fact

• Transparency is treated as optional

The Senate’s move signals that patience with that approach is wearing thin.

Defense secretaries rarely have their discretionary budgets used as leverage. When it happens, it is usually because lawmakers believe normal oversight channels have failed.

Bottom line

The Senate did not block Trump’s defense agenda. It funded it.

But it also sent a clear message: unchecked military action has consequences, even under a friendly Congress.

Whether Pete Hegseth releases the strike video or continues to resist will determine more than his own standing. It will determine whether Congress can still meaningfully constrain how and where the United States uses lethal force.