Trump’s ‘Donroe Doctrine’ is dangerous. Idaho’s Risch should know better | Opinion

Say what you will of U.S. Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, but he’s arguably one of the most knowledgeable and experienced foreign policy experts in the U.S. today.

Risch has been on the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations for nearly 20 years and is serving his second stint as the chairman of that committee.

Unfortunately, he has rendered the Foreign Relations Committee irrelevant.

Take the kidnapping of Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro under the guise of being a law enforcement action to halt drug trafficking.

“When you’re in the business of flooding drugs into the United States, having elections the way Maduro got into power, that’s not right,” Risch told Fox News, parroting President Donald Trump’s talking points. “It’s not good for our hemisphere. It’s bad for the United States of America, bad for the American people who we work for.”

But the naked admission by the Trump administration after the fact that this was all about seizing Venezuela’s oil reserves belies the pretense of a military incursion.

Where is the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in all of this?

Where are the hearings on the kidnapping of Maduro and Trump’s vow to “run” the country? Where are the hearings on the extrajudicial killings of suspected drug trafficking boats in the Caribbean?

Once a vocal supporter of U.S. Agency for International Development, Risch sat by silently as Trump and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency dismantled it and even voted in favor of completely defunding it.

What about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine? Was the missile that hit western Ukraine recently a message to Europe that the “Putin Doctrine” is in effect for Russia’s sphere of influence? Could Poland be next? What about Romania? Why haven’t we heard from Risch about this new development?

For that matter, where is the committee when it comes to all of Trump’s obsessions, such as making Canada a state or taking over Greenland? Trump’s actions elsewhere and his ridiculous rhetoric on Greenland beg for oversight and guidance from the Senate.

But Risch just watches and nods.

In doing so, he’s shirking his duty.

His role — and the role of Congress — is not simply to be a rubber stamp for the executive branch; it is to be a check on the executive branch. But Congress under Republican control has abdicated that constitutional duty — with a Republican president, of course.

We can’t help but imagine what Risch’s reaction would have been if President Biden had invaded Venezuela.

Trump’s actions are being labeled “Donroe Doctrine,” after the Monroe Doctrine, James Monroe’s 1823 warning that the Western Hemisphere was under the United States’ “sphere of influence,” and that Europe should not meddle in the affairs of countries in our neighborhood.

So the United States might not be the policeman of the world, but we apparently are now the policeman of half the world? Is this the path we want to take the country down? Seems like a germane question for the Foreign Relations Committee.

Let us posit this: If the United States can invade a foreign country, kidnap its president, take control of its resources and “run” the country, all under the guise of that country being situated within our sphere of influence, what is stopping China from invading Taiwan — certainly well within China’s sphere of influence — and taking over its valuable resource of semiconductors?

Taiwan, by the way, produces 60% of the world’s semiconductors. China produces another 20%.

Risch has long understood — rightly so — that China is “the greatest long‑term threat to the United States.”

But by invading Venezuela, the United States has lost any claim to moral high ground and has opened the door for China to do the same.

Surely, Risch understands this.

Unfortunately, he’s not acting like it.

Statesman editorials are the opinion of the Idaho Statesman’s editorial board. Board members are opinion editor Scott McIntosh, opinion writer Bryan Clark, editor Chadd Cripe, assistant editor Jim Keyser and community members John Hess, Debbie McCormick and Julie Yamamoto.