Transcript: Sen. Tim Kaine on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan," Jan. 11, 2026

The following is the transcript of the interview with Sen. Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, that aired on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" on Jan. 11, 2026.

MARGARET BRENNAN: We go now to Richmond, Virginia, where we find Senator Tim Kaine, who has oversight in foreign relations and other key committees. Senator, we know the president has been briefed on military options, but our reporting is no decision made, no military assets put in place to execute anything yet. There aren't even any aircraft carriers in the Mideast region at this moment in time, would you support military action?

SENATOR TIM KAINE: Margaret, U.S. military action in Iran would be a massive mistake. It would have the effect of giving the Iranian regime the ability to say it's the U.S. that's screwing our country up. Right now, Iranians are blaming, appropriately, the regime for screwing up the country. This Iranian regime has spent years focusing outside its borders on fomenting terrorism and aggression in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Gaza, instead of listening to the needs of its own citizens, and much like Syrian citizens, finally threw off the yoke of Bashar al-Assad and that brutal regime without U.S. military intervention, it looks to be that Iran is doing the same. So let's celebrate their freedom loving spirit. Let's keep up the sanctions pressure, which helped in Syria and is helping, I think, dramatize the- the misdeeds of this regime. But U.S. military action would just bring back the painful history of the U.S. toppling the Iranian prime minister back in the 1950s and would give the regime the ability to blame their own failures on the United States.

MARGARET BRENNAN: You mentioned Syria there. There was some, you know, covert U.S. support. There was something in the beginning, at least with that kind of uprising, would you support any kind of help? I mean, the president saying we're going to help the protesters. What does that mean? Or what should it look like?

SEN. KAINE: Well, I think again, let's use sanctions. In Syria, the Caesar sanctions that we put in place in 2019 to punish Bashar al-Assad for war crimes had a real effect on the Syrian energy, construction and other sectors. And when Syria chose to go a new path, President Trump, with the support of a bipartisan Congress, has reduced those sanctions to open up a new chapter in life for Syria. That's the right answer, but military action, we did not take military action against Bashar al-Assad. We have been engaged militarily in Syria to fight ISIS, because ISIS was part of al-Qaeda, there's a Military Authorization for Use of U.S. Force against ISIS. We've worked with other nations to reduce them, but we didn't use military action against Bashar al-Assad. And we shouldn't use military action against the Iranian government in this- in this protest moment, let's support these brave freedom fighters in other ways, through sanctions, but not use our sons and daughters in the military to do so.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Just very quickly, when you mentioned there was authorization for force in Syria and ISIS, I assume that means you support the military strikes that took place yesterday against 35 targets in Syria. This was in response to the killing of those two U.S. soldiers and an American interpreter. That's valid, in your view?

SEN. KAINE: Yeah, yeah, it is legally valid that it has long been held that the 2001 congressional authorization against al-Qaeda includes the ability to go against groups that have come out of or have affiliated with al-Qaeda that mean harm to the U.S. troops. And in this instance, ISIS is still a threat to U.S. troops. There is a legal authorization for the U.S. of force, which is what makes this so different than the use of the military force against Venezuela or Greenland or Cuba or wherever the president wants to take us to war next.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, you're taking me to the next topic, which is this effort you led. You got about five Republican senators to join your effort in this procedural vote to restrict the president's actions, he would require new congressional approval before new military action in Venezuela. Do you think the Republicans who were with you on this vote will stay with you, given that the president has openly threatened them?

SEN. KAINE: Margaret, I think they will, and I think more may join. The five republicans who voted with me, let's be clear what they were voting for. The Trump administration has waged war, first against Venezuelan boats in international waters, then covert action in Venezuela, and now an attack on Venezuela to depose its leadership, to establish a new government that we chose, not that the Venezuelan people chose, to seize Venezuela's economy and even say we're going to set the terms of economic and political transition for the next few years. What my Republican colleagues voted for is, let's get this out of the classified and put it before the American public and actually debate this use of the U.S. military on the floor of the United States Senate. Four months into it, hundreds of Venezuelans dead, American troops injured, let's finally debate this publicly. That's all they voted for, and the fact that the president is going against them just for wanting to have this debate before the public, shows how nervous the president is about both his legal authority, but also the wisdom of what he's doing.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah, he said publicly they should not be re-elected because they- they issued this, this call for congressional review. You brought up Greenland. This is the- the territory that Denmark has broad governance over, Denmark being a NATO ally. World leaders take President Trump's remarks seriously. We take him seriously and literally. And to that point, Denmark's Prime Minister publicly warned that it would mean the end of the NATO alliance if he carries out what he said. Which as recently as Friday, he said, I want to make a deal for Greenland the easy way, but if we don't do it the easy way, we are going to do it the hard way. Is there anything to stop the president from doing it quote, unquote, "the hard way," which sounds like military force?

SEN. KAINE: Margaret, I think Congress will stop them, both Democrats and Republicans. This would be disastrous. It wouldn't just be "America First." It wouldn't just be the end of NATO, it would be America alone. If we take our best allies, and Denmark has been an ally for a very long time, and we decide that we have the military ability to seize territory for them, you will see the United States, instead of being the world's chief diplomat and a leader in the world, you'll see the United States isolated as a pariah. And I've talked to my Republican colleagues, they- they watch what the president has done is Venezue- in Venezuela. They hear the threats against other nations. I can tell you this, we will force a vote in the Senate about no U.S. military action in Greenland or Denmark. If we need to, we will get overwhelming bipartisan support that this president is foolish to even suggest this. We're not going to do it the hard way, and we're not going to do it the easy way, either we're going to continue to work with Denmark as a sovereign nation that we're allied with, and we're not going to treat them as an adversary or as an enemy.

MARGARET BRENNAN: We will watch for action in Congress on that front. Senator Kaine, thank you for your time today. We'll be right back.

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