Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro, allegedly captured by American forces during President Trump’s ordered air assault on the South American nation early Saturday morning, will be prosecuted on a grand jury indictment handed down in Manhattan, according to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi.
Maduro, the socialist president who had led Venezuela with an iron fist since 2013, and his wife, Cilia Flores, were apprehended as they attempted to fly out of the country, Trump claimed on Jan. 3. He had ordered air strikes on military installations inside Venezuela amid growing tensions between both nations; the Trump administration had accused Maduro of running Venezuela as a “narco-state,” serving as a pipeline for illegal drugs and gang activity.
During an address to the nation on Saturday morning, Trump said that the U.S. has effectively taken over Venezuela — and would “run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition.” There is no immediate timetable for when that transition will take effect.
When asked if the armed forces were going in to occupy the country, Trump said, “We’re not afraid of boots on the ground if we have to. We had boots on the ground last night.”
Moreover, the president indicated that American oil companies would take the lead in operating “the oil business in Venezuela,” which he called “a total bust for a long period of time.”
“We’re going to have our very large United States oil companies, the biggest anywhere in the world, go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money for the country.”
No American troops were killed in Saturday’s initial operation, according to the president. There was no indication of whether Congress approved it. The number of casualties in Venezuela from the bombings was not yet known.
Congress is typically notified by the president of military action; the legislature has the sole authority to declare war on a foreign power.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-Brooklyn) charged that “the Trump administration has not sought congressional authorization for the use of military force and has failed to properly notify Congress in advance of the operation in Venezuela.”
The promotion of security and stability in a region requires more than just military force as we painfully discovered in Iraq and Afghanistan. Far too many questions remain unanswered, including with respect to whether further military actions are planned,” Jeffries said. “Pursuant to the Constitution, the framers gave Congress the sole power to declare war as the branch of government closest to the American people. The House and Senate must be briefed immediately and compelling evidence to explain and justify this unauthorized use of military force should be presented forthwith.”
Queens U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks, ranking member of the House Foreign Services Committee, charged that Trump had used “the U.S. military to attempt regime change in a sovereign foreign nation, without approval from Congress, without a defined objective or plan for the day after, and without support from our allies,” adding that it “risks entangling the United States in an open-ended conflict in Venezuela that could destabilize the entire region.”
“This action is also a violation of international law and further undermines America’s global standing,” said Meeks, who also condemned Maduro as an “illegitimate leader.”
“Congress must reassert its constitutional role before this escalation leads to greater instability, chaos, and unnecessary risk to American lives,” the Congress member added.
Maduro heading to NY on a ship
Trump told Fox News that Maduro and Flores were apprehended by special operations forces and flown to the USS Iwo Jima, an amphibious assault ship stationed in the Caribbean. Maduro is being transferred to New York via ship to await trial on a federal indictment in the Southern District of New York, according to Trump.
Trump stated that the operation was conducted jointly by the U.S. military and law enforcement partners, although the exact legal authority for the U.S. to carry out the strikes was not immediately clear.
Ahead of Saturday’s operation, the U.S. military, upon the orders of Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, had repeatedly struck vessels off the Venezuelan coast that they allege were involved in narcotics operations; at least 110 people were killed in those strikes. Trump had also ordered a blockade of Venezuelan oil shipments, which under international law is considered an act of war, and had seized at least one oil carrier.
Bondi said Maduro and Flores would “face the full wrath of American justice on American soil” and be prosecuted on various charges, including narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices against the United States, according to The Hill.
As for Venezuela, it is unclear who is running the country with Maduro now in American custody. Maduro had publicly denied Trump’s accusations of narco-terrorism, alleging that the U.S. only sought regime change in Venezuela to gain control of the nation’s vast oil supply.
The military operation also prompted great concern among neighboring nations in South America and the Caribbean.
