Danielle Kurtzleben

His attack on Venezuela suggests his views have changed since then.

But foreign policy experts tell NPR that his staff simply enables his foreign policy instincts far more than in his first term.

Trump's foreign policy this term has not been driven by high ideals like neoconservatism.

Rather, it's about power and resources, like Venezuela's oil.

Danielle Kurtzleben, NPR News, the White House.

I'm going in February.

So I'll tell you about the tacos.

I'm Danielle Kurtzleben.

I cover the White House.

And I'm Mara Liason, senior national political correspondent.

So neoconservative fundamentally was about exporting values, nation-building, meaning that the Iraqis were going to embrace the kind of democratic values and human rights that Americans had.

It didn't work out so well, and it's very, very different than the kind of interventionism we're seeing now with Donald Trump.

But not because he rejected the results of an election.

America came in and said, we're going to topple this guy because, well, he's been indicted in the United States for drug crimes, but they didn't go in there because he refused to accept the results of a democratic election.

They went in there to get Maduro and to get the oil.

That's the difference between Trump and neoconservatives, except I will say there is one big exception.

And as Danielle says, you know,

Parties are made up of many different people with many different approaches to foreign policy.

But there is one big former neoconservative.

Some people would say he still is one in the Trump administration, and that's Marco Rubio.