The most important detail in this story is the one the White House doesn’t want you to linger on: the alarms were already sounding before the missiles flew.

Days before news broke of the U.S. strike on Venezuela, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries went on the record calling for a congressional investigation into Donald Trump’s health and capacity to govern. Not hypothetically, and not “someday,” right now! He accused the administration of withholding basic transparency, challenged Oversight Chair James Comer to stop hiding behind partisan paralysis, and argued that Congress has an affirmative duty, as a co-equal branch of government, to ensure the president is capable of doing the job the American people elected him to do. That interview preceded Trump’s military escalation into Venezuela.

At roughly the same time, reporting and commentary across MeidasTouch documented a growing list of contradictions and warning signs the White House has been unable, or unwilling, to coherently explain. Trump publicly claimed to have received a “perfect” MRI, only to later insist it was not an MRI at all, but a CT scan. His physician apparently didn’t notice the difference between a 45-minute neurological imaging procedure and a 45-second scan. He boasts repeatedly about passing the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, a basic screening tool not designed to certify executive fitness, while medical experts point out that frequent repetition of the test raises more questions than it answers. He admits to taking a daily aspirin dose far exceeding standard preventative guidelines, a practice with no clear medical justification and visible side effects.

None of this on its own proves incapacity, but that’s not the point. Oversight is not about diagnosis; it’s about verification.

What makes the Venezuela strike so consequential is not that it “confirms” anything, but that it raises the stakes of inaction. When Congress is already on notice about unresolved concerns regarding a president’s health, transparency, and decision-making clarity, every major national security action becomes a stress test. The Constitution does not ask lawmakers to wait until something goes catastrophically wrong. It asks them to act as a safeguard before that happens.

This is where timing matters. Jeffries’ call for hearings and subpoenas did not emerge from partisan opportunism after a crisis. It came before the administration escalated abroad. That sequencing matters because it strips away the most common dismissal: that Democrats are simply reacting to bad headlines or foreign policy controversy. Not true; they were responding to inconsistencies, opacity, and a White House that insists the public trust it, while repeatedly contradicting itself.

And now, after a strike that risks further regional destabilization, Congress is being asked to pretend those earlier warnings don’t exist. James Comer, who spent years obsessively probing Joe Biden’s cognitive fitness, has suddenly lost his appetite for oversight. The same committee that subpoenaed, televised, and sensationalized every rumor about Biden’s health now greets Trump’s documented contradictions with silence. In a nuclear-armed world, oversight delayed is oversight denied.

This is not about invoking the 25th Amendment by fiat. It’s not about declaring a diagnosis from cable clips or viral videos. It’s about the most basic principle of democratic governance: when credible questions arise about the capacity of the commander in chief, Congress does not look away.

The strike on Venezuela didn’t create these concerns; it amplified them. It transformed what some were content to dismiss as political noise into a matter of risk management. When decisions carry global consequences, the margin for denial shrinks.

Congress should reconvene. Hearings should be held. Subpoenas should be issued. Independent medical testimony should be heard under oath. Not because disaster is inevitable, but because preventing disaster is literally the job.