Nick Schifrin:

Yes, that's the big question.

So, what the senators said today is, they want to distinguish between Mohammed bin Salman and Saudi Arabia. They want to somehow punish the prince without affecting the strategic alliance.

There's a couple of options on the table right now. One is a bill from Senator Sanders and Lee that would end the war in Yemen that is basically being led by the Saudis. There's some problems with that. Some of it is controversial. But over 60 senators voted to have a vote on that next week, and that will probably happen. But that's just about Yemen.

The second option goes further. It's a bill sponsored by Senator Menendez, ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, along with Senator Graham, that would end arms sales to Saudi Arabia and require sanctions on anyone connected to Jamal Khashoggi's death.

And there's a third option, which Senator Graham raised today, which is some kind of sense of the Senate, MBS is guilty and ordered Khashoggi's murder, again, more of a guilt MBS and don't change the Saudi relationship.

But Senator Bob Corker today said, look, this is really hard. We don't have consensus. Maybe the president should just come out and criticize MBS and call him responsible for the murder.

And so there's no guarantee that the Senate can turn all this rhetoric into policy change. It's rare, as you know, for senators to try and forcibly change foreign policy of the administration — clearly an indication today that bipartisan senators want to do just that.