High-ranking Republicans have expressed outrage over Trump's statement on the Khashoggi killing, in which he refused to impose significant sanctions against Saudi Arabia. Will their words be followed by actions?
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The usual suspects — Senators Jeff Flake and Bob Corker — who both have routinely denounced Trump and sparred with him since he took office nearly two years ago, took the lead.
"'Great allies' don't plot the murder of journalists, Mr. President," Arizona Senator Flake wrote on Twitter on Tuesday. "'Great allies' don't lure their own citizens into a trap, then kill them."
Not to be outdone, Corker, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, took to Twitter declaring, "I never thought I'd see the day a White House would moonlight as a public relations firm for the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia."
In several additional tweets, Corker wrote that the president is legally required to determine and report to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee whether Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed Bin Salman is responsible for the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and vowed that Congress would consider all tools at its disposal to address the issue.
Outgoing Senator Jeff Flake has been a constant critic of TrumpImage: Getty Images/AFP/S. Loeb
Talk is cheap and time is running out
There is only one problem with Corker's tough-sounding pronouncements. He only has about 30 days left as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee before he leaves Congress, having decided not to seek re-election in the face of Trump's opposition to his candidacy. The same is true for Flake, who also decided to call it quits instead of trying to fight Trump and hold on to his Senate seat. The two senators have done little to follow up their verbal criticism of Trump with legislative action during much of their tenure, which raises the question of why that should change now.
What makes the verbal grandstanding by Flake and Corker, as well as by other prominent Republicans, including Senators Lindsay Graham and Rand Paul, ring even more hollow is that it is highly unlikely that the lame-duck Republican Congress in its last few weeks left will produce any meaningful legislation on any issue, let alone one where it is sure to clash with the White House.
"We have seen in the past when a number of Republicans expressed their unhappiness with or dismay about an action the president has taken, some vow to do something about it, but rarely does anything happen," said Norman Ornstein, a congressional scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI).
Reed Galen, a former Republican strategist who worked on the campaigns of John McCain, Arnold Schwarzenegger and George W. Bush, and is now chief strategist of the Serve America Movement, which wants to end the two-party dominance in Washington, was even blunter.
"My hope of them confronting him on whatever the issue might be that is sort of contrary to tradition or even decency is long dead," he said when asked about the likelihood of congressional Republicans taking on Trump not just in word but deed over the Khashoggi killing.
Jamal Khashoggi: A mysterious disappearance and death
Official Saudi statements on the fate of journalist Jamal Khashoggi have changed several times since he disappeared at the Istanbul consulate on October 2. DW traces the most important events in this intricate case.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/J. Martin
Vanishes into thin air
October 2: Prominent journalist Jamal Khashoggi was last seen entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, where he had gone to obtain an official document for his upcoming marriage to his Turkish fiancee, Hatice Cengiz. He never emerged from the building, prompting Cengiz, who waited outside, to raise the alarm.
Image: Reuters TV
Confusion over whereabouts
October 3: Turkish and Saudi officials came up with conflicting reports on Khashoggi's whereabouts. Riyadh said the journalist had left the mission shortly after his work was done. But Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said the journalist was still in the consulate.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/V. Mayo
Murder claims
October 6: Turkish officials said they believed the journalist was likely killed inside the Saudi consulate. The Washington Post, for which Khashoggi wrote, cited unnamed sources to report that Turkish investigators believe a 15-member team "came from Saudi Arabia" to kill the man.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/H. Jamali
Ankara seeks proof
October 8: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on Saudi Arabia to prove that Khashoggi left its consulate in Istanbul. Turkey also sought permission to search the mission premises. US President Donald Trump voiced concern about the journalist's disappearance.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/T. Kovacs
'Davos in the Desert' hit
October 12: British billionaire Richard Branson halted talks over a $1 billion Saudi investment in his Virgin group's space ventures, citing Khashoggi's case. He also pulled out of an investment conference in Riyadh dubbed the "Davos in the Desert." His move was followed by Uber's Dara Khosrowshahi, JP Morgan's Jamie Dimon and a host of other business leaders.
Image: picture alliance/dpa
Search operation
October 15: Turkish investigators searched the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The search lasted more than eight hours and investigators removed samples from the building, including soil from the consulate garden and a metal door, one official said.
Image: Reuters/M. Sezer
Death after fistfight
October 19: Saudi Arabia finally admitted that Khashoggi died at the consulate. The kingdom's public prosecutor said preliminary investigations showed the journalist was killed in a "fistfight." He added that 18 people had been detained. A Saudi Foreign Ministry official said the country is "investigating the regrettable and painful incident."
Image: Getty Images/C. McGrath
'Grave mistake'
October 21: Saudi Arabia provided yet another account of what happened to Khashoggi. The kingdom's foreign minister admitted the journalist was killed in a "rogue operation," calling it a "huge and grave mistake," but insisted that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had not been aware of the murder. Riyadh said it had no idea where Khashoggi's body was.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/C. Owen
Germany halts arms sales
October 21: German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany would put arms exports to Saudi Arabia on hold for the time being, given the unexplained circumstances of Khashoggi's death. Germany is the fourth largest exporter of weapons to Saudi Arabia after the United States, Britain and France.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/S. Sauer
Strangled to death, dissolved in acid
October 31: The Turkish prosecutor concluded that Khashoggi was strangled to death soon after entering the consulate, and was then dismembered. Another Turkish official later claimed the body was dissolved in acid. Turkish President Erdogan said the order to murder the journalist came from "the highest levels" of Saudi Arabia's government.
Image: picture-alliance/AA/M. E. Yildirim
Grilled at the UN
November 5: Saudi Arabia told the United Nations it would prosecute those responsible for Khashoggi's murder. This came as the United States and dozens of other countries raised the journalist's death before the UN Human Rights Council and called for a transparent investigation.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/F. Coffrini
Fiancee in mourning
November 8: Khashoggi's fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, wrote on Twitter that she was "unable to express her sorrow" upon learning that the journalist's body was dissolved with chemicals. "Are these killers and those behind it human beings?" she tweeted.
Image: Reuters/Haberturk
Turkey shares audio recordings
November 10: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan reveals that officials from Saudi Arabia, the US, Germany, France and Britain have listened to audio recordings related to the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/Presidential Press Service
Symbolic funeral prayers
November 16: A symbolic funeral prayer for Khashoggi is held in the courtyard of the Fatih Mosque in Istanbul. Yasin Aktay, advisor to President Erdogan, speaks at the service.
Image: Reuters/M. Sezer
Saudi-owned villas searched
November 26: Turkish forensic police bring the investigation to the Turkish province of Yalova, where sniffer dogs and drones search two Saudi-owned villas in the village Samanli.
Image: Reuters/O . Orsal
100 days since killing
January 10: Amnesty International Turkey members demonstrate outside the Saudi Arabia Consulate in Istanbul, marking 100 day since the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. One woman holds up a street sign which reads "Jamal Khashoggi Street". The organization has called for an international investigation into the case.
Image: Reuters/M. Sezer
Saudi murder trial begins
January 3: The Khashoggi trial begins in Saudi Arabia, where state prosecutors say they will seek the death sentence for five of the eleven suspects. A request for the gathered evidence has been send to Turkish authorities. A date for the second hearing has not yet been set.
Image: picture-alliance/abaca/Depo Photos
UN inquiry team in Turkey
January 28: Agnes Callamard, who is leading the UN probe into the handling of the Khashoggi case, arrives in Ankara where she meets with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. The human rights expect will stay in the country for the rest of the week to speak with prosecutors and others involved in the case.
But for Jamie Fly, a former foreign policy adviser to Senator Marco Rubio, the issue is far from settled. While he concedes that it is unlikely that the lame-duck Congress will take action, the new Congress, including many Republican lawmakers, may well force the issue.
"If the administration continues to act like there is no problem here and that business can go on as usual, I think they are going to be headed to a confrontation of some sort with Congress," said Fly, now a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund.
He noted that unlike many other issues, such as immigration, how to deal with Saudi Arabia was not a primary concern for Trump's political base, which could make it easier for Republicans to break with him on the issue. In fact, he added, there have been widespread misgivings about close US-Saudi ties, the arms sales and the Yemen conflict among both Democrats and Republicans for years.
"I don't think this is an issue where it is difficult for Republicans to take a stand," said Fly.
Trump has vowed to not let the Khashoggi murder spoil the business ties with the Saudis Image: Reuters/J. Ernst
AEI's Ornstein shares the view that Saudi Arabia is not a huge issue for Trump voters. But given the GOP's record and the potential hurdles a bill would face, he remains deeply skeptical that any significant legislative action that would sanction Saudi Arabia will succeed in the current or the incoming Congress.
"Almost anything Congress will do, the president will veto," said Ornstein, which would then require two-thirds of both chambers of Congress to be overridden. "I hope I am pleasantly surprised and I am wrong, but I don't see anything at this point — nothing in history — that would support that."
What's more, predicted former GOP strategist Galen, "Given the speed of political news these days and the sort of string out outrages – next week we will be onto something else."
Said Ornstein: "What we have is a lot of sound, a lot of fury and no action."
