1/3/25: BREAKING: TRUMP BOMBS VENEZUELA, KIDNAPS MADURO

trafficking ring. There is zero evidence to back this up, and at other times administration officials and their allies have made plain that their actual interest in Venezuela has to do with the natural resources there and specifically the oil. So here we go. Let me put up on the

screen what the President posted initially to social media. To truth social he said, the United States of America has successfully carried down a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicholas Maduro, who has been along with his wife, captured and flown out of the country. This operation was done in conjunction with the US law enforcement. Details to follow. There will be a news conference today

at eleven am. At mar A Lago. Let me go ahead and give you what Pam Bondi, the Attorney General, is saying about these charges. She says, Nicholas Maduro and his wife, Celia Flora, has been indicted in the Southern District of New York. Maduro has been charged with 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. They will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil and American courts, on behalf of the entire USDOJ. I'd like to thank President Trump for having the courage to demand accountability on behalf of the American people. A huge thank you to our brief military who conducted this incredible and highly successful mission

to capture these two alleged international narco traffickers. I will remind you that just shortly short time ago, Trump pardoned an actual drug trafficker, one Orlando Hernandez, former president of Honduras, seemingly because some of Trump's tech oligarch buddies were mad about their prospero crypto fiefdom being undermined in that country.

But in any case, if you had any illusion that Trump actually cares about the drugs, that should be thoroughly dismantled by the fact of his recent pardon of that former president of Honduras, one Orlando Hernandez, who actually was involved in drug smuggling and drug trafficking. Here we go Trump on Fox and Friends talking about the incredible raid as he describes it, that captured kidnapped Maduro and his wife's God and take a listen to this.

a television show. And if you would have seen the speed, the violence, you know they say that the speed the violence, they used that term just it was an amazing thing, an amazing job that these people did there's nobody else could have done anything like it.

every possible situation. And they just broke in and they broke into places that were not really able to be broke into, you know, steel doors that were put there for just this reason, and they got taken out in a matter of seconds. I've never seen anything like it.

did another one not so long ago. It was called the knocking out of the the Iranian nuclear threat, the nuclear power that was. That was unbelievable what they did there, and this is something that I don't know. It's amazing. And to have a few injuries but no death on our side is really amazing, mister President.

dispatch about what we know at this point. You know, we we have learned a little bit more since this was posted. But if I could go through here a little bit of their report. They talk about how explosions were reported at key military basis, civilian areas, and other sites across the Venezuelan capital of Gracus and surrounding areas. In the early hours, Venezuelan government sent an official statement the attack was perpetrated by the US and constitutes a

grave military aggression against Venezuelan territory and population. They go on to talk about the Trump Truth social post. They say venezuel and Vice President Delca Rodriguez spoke to Teleisur shortly after confirmed that following this brutal situation, brutal attack, we are unaware of the whereabouts of the President, Nicholas

Maduro and that of the first Lady, Celia Flores. Now, one thing that is worth noting here is that apparently the vice president is now in charge, so while Maduro has been kidnapped and removed to face charges in the US, which I mean, you guys can only imagine how the

US would react if our president was kidnapped. But in any case, the rest of their administration appears to be intact and in control, so not the Nobel Peace Prize winning opposition leader, US puppet Machado but continues to be Delca Rodriguez and the rest of Maduro's administration so far appears to continue to be in control. So that is very significant. I also wanted to show you here they have a list of the sites that have been struck.

According to sources in Venezuela, they say Tiona Fort, major military complex in the southwest of Caracas, La Carloda Base and air base in Caracas, and La Guera Port and Naval Command, forgive my lack of Spanish pronunciation, port facility and Naval Command located in Laguera state, higaror Rote Airport, airport in the coastal town in the state of Miranda. So those are the places that we know have been

struck at this point. And with that, for additional reaction analysis, I'm going to go ahead and get to Jose Louis Granado Seja, who is the head of the Latin America desk for drop Site News. Jose luis great to have.

America in general. Kidnapping the president, I think that's the accurate term. You know, let's talk about him being captured. I believe he's being held prisoner as a captive on the Ewojima, which is one of the many boats that was stationed just off the coast of Venezuela. With this massive mobilization of the US Navy, a fourth of the

Navy is still in Caribbean waters. This situation is what we always feared what would happen, And it appears that the US has successfully kidnapped Nicolas Maduro and set in a terrible precedent for the region, for the country. I think we are in a new day here in Latin America as a result of what happened.

And so all of that response to that, everything that we've seen over the last few months is a response to that drive by these actors, including Trump as well, of course, who were seeking to oust by any means necessary, these leftist, progressive revolutionary governments in the region, and and you know the attacks on the extrajudicial executions that were happening, This land strike that happened a few weeks ago, and now obviously with the kidnapping of the president is just

the latest iteration of a very long, a decades long regime change effort. Venezuela's now a country that has seen two of its president's kidnapped. To remember, in two thousand and two, the US bakkup against Ugo Chavas that briefly deposed him. He was held prisoner for two days as well, although he eventually was returned thanks to the uprising of the people. We're already seeing the population mobilizing in Venezuela. But this is what it is. It's regime change. It's

regime change using violent, deadly methods. Where As already reports of civilians being killed as a result of these US strikes inside of Venezuela and this effort to kidnap Nicolasma Duro, and so all of that is because, on the one hand, as I said, the Bowlervarion revolution, this process that started with the election of Ugo chava Is back in nineteen ninety eight, is always something that represented a threat to US elites, to U segeminy in the region. But it's

also about resources. I mean Trump has said as much in those words that it's about the oil. It's about the oil, it's about the golds, about the national resources. Right now, it looks like the revolutionary regime is still in control of the country, doesn't appear that the opposition is in a position to be able to try to seize power, which means that they actually won't have access

to these resources. The situations dramatically change. I find it difficult to imagine any kind of negotiations happening with the US now except for the release of the president. And so there will probably still be that impulse in Washington, in the White House to continue to try to find a way to have access to those resources. That's what this is really from.

of the country. So, yes, it's a regime change in the sense that the president has been you know, kidnapped in deposed, but the rest of the regime is still intact and in place.

willing to go. The only reason he's not in charge today is because he's been kidnapped, and so that put you know, basically two unstoppable forces that eventually ran into each other. And this appears to be the sort of action where Trump can try to walk away from the conundrum that he has created in South America to say, well, we took out Madudo, that's what we wanted. This is a law enforcement action, but there are still very important forces. They're going to continue to push for the end of

the Braverian revolution in Venezuela. That's what is also going to be on the table in the coming days and weeks or maybe perhaps longer in terms of what is going to happen next. I imagine that they're going to try to use this as an end point for them, but I don't really think that that's going to be successful, because we have to understand that the initially these strikes on these alleged drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean, these all started as an effort to appease the Florida Gusano

labby to try to get them on board. Actually, way back when they were negotiations around the Big Beautiful Bill, these lawmakers, these representatives were seeking for Trump to end the Chevron license, to end Chevron's activities in Venezuela, to send a single to their allies in the hard right reactionary opposition in Venezuela that the US was still there

for them. Because Trump wasn't willing to do that, he turned to this this so called drug operation, which really, as we said earlier, is really about regime change in order to win their support, and he did. But they're going to keep pushing for that. They're not going to be okay with Delci Rodriguez or the Odeldo gave O key figures in Venezuela politics in power, and so I don't think this is actually going to represent it. And of course we have to think about the Venezuelan response

and the broader response from Latin America. I really do think that there are a lot of elected leaders in this region who are wondering what this means for their relationship with the United States. I mean I think about Mexico. For example, he has used similar language to describe Modena, the ruling party here in Mexico, saying that they're tied to drugs, that the drugs cartels run Mexico, you know,

classifying fentanela as a weapon of mass destruction. How do we know he won't use the same arguments against Mexico. He's already tried to use them against Betro in Columbia. So this is really a major crisis in the Western hemisphere.

sought or received. So they are using this pretext of, oh, well, we've indicted him and he's, you know, a drug trafficker, and this was all in self defense and that's why we're able to do it without congressional authorization, which I think is told in complete bullshit. But in any case. Can you talk about this flimsy pretext of claiming that Maduro is some sort of drug trafficker and that being the justification here and the rationale for why they kidnapped him.

their territorial waters. But this is clearly an action outside of that, trying to enforce US law in this way. We've seen it before. There are historic presidents for this, obviously, I'm thinking about Monuento Rea and Panama. But no, there's no legality to this, nor is there any legality to

the extra judicial executions. And yet, unfortunately, because I think there wasn't enough pushback against those, you know, policymakers felt emboldened to do something like this to continue to flo out international humanitarian law, as we also saw in the genocide against the Palestinian people. We live in a very very dangerous world where it really doesn't carry any weight anymore and its might makes right apparently, and that's what we saw here. There is no in terms of the

actual allegations of narco trafficking. They're all in an invention. The Cartel of the Suns, which is the one that they claim that Madudo is the head of, does not even exist. And it's the UN that says it. It's DA reports that say the Cartel of the Suns is not an actual cartel in the way that we usually understand that term.

There may be individual elements within the Venezuelan state who are engaged in drug trafficking, as there is in a lot of states of Latin America because of the massive demand from the United States for drugs to come into their territory. But that doesn't mean that Madudo is the head of our cartel or even the trend that I

was you know, this has been overstated. It's a criminal organization, but it's not a cartel in that you know, when you think about you know, the ones that operate in Mexico for example, right button for example, this is a criminal group that kind of uses this name as branding in order to intimidate and to exercise influence over certain Venezuelans in particular, but Latin American migrants who are in the region, They're not at an organization the way that they've

been depicted. It is like we saw, you know, in the early two thousands rhetoric, a campaign to try to manufacture consent for what are clearly illegal actions.

For the example when it comes to Venezuela, is also that the US already had thousands of troops inside of Panama because of the canal zone and the rest of it. And so you know, the ability to quickly affect regime change in Panama did happen, right, They were able to put in, you know, a puppet regime that kind of you know, dissolved everything that that Noriega had done previously. Nodiero was obviously captured, taken to the United States and is still in prison or was in prison in the

United States because of that operation. This one's different because there's no troops in the United States of the United States. It appears inside of Venezuela at this point appears it was strictly focused on finding, capturing and kidnapping Maduro. Apparently, according to New York Times, it was CIA in formant inside of Madudo's in a circle that actually allowed them

to know his location. And so that probably is the reason why facilitated the quick operation that we saw last night, as well as you know, overwhelming attack on Venezuela's defense capabilities.

There was a report from the Basil La Carlotta where they had anti aircraft missile batteries there that were destroyed before the actual helicopters, the Chinook helicopters started flying in So in that sense, there is the parallel of capturing and kidnapping and detaining a sitting president, but it's very different in the sense that if they think that this is been going to lead to regime change, I don't think that's actually on the table, given the fact that

there's probably going to be a lot of detentions in the coming hours and days. You know, the Venezuelan hardline opposition is probably celebrating what just happened here. That is a counter patriotic sentiment is obviously illegal, especially in the context of an external threat that has been declared in Venezuela. So it's unlikely they'll even have the Cadre attempt a regime change effort led by the Venezuelan O position.

their territory. We're talking about armed self defense groups that do exist here. They've talked about a war of all the people. Now, if there is boots on the ground by the United States, if this does escalate even further, you're going to see a very, very complicated situation of un armed resistance not just by the state but non state actors inside of Anezuela to expel these invasing forces and send them back home in coffins. That's what's going

to happen if there is an invasion. Right now, we're seeing mobilization by the grassroots, by the Tavista supporters, by these revolutionary organizations into the streets. Now, my colleagues are in the streets now, you know, at these spontaneous demonstrations. There's a lot of questions in the air. Ultimately, right now the demand is give us proof of life. We want to know he's still alive. And we'll see what the demand becomes in the coming days in terms of

what the population wants to see. But I would imagine that in addition to that is an immediate return of the kidnapped president. He is the president of Venezuela. He is the president recognized by countries throughout the hemisphere and the world with important allies. The special envoy from China for Latin America was just in Venezuela yesterday. Russia obviously has very clear ties and so this can very quickly become a broad geopolitical issue for the entire globe. But domestically,

you can count on the Venezuelan people to resist. They will be on the streets as they are already in this very moment.

What sort of broader geopolitical implications do you see of this brazenly lawless might make the right sort of law of the jungle action.

groups within the nations to take much firmer positions. I think, in particular in Latin America, this has to be a wake up call. There was a lot of pressure for there to be at least a statement some kind of pushback. I had called for an ad hoc group. If the regional organizations are not willing or able to push back

against all of this, illegality. Then whoever is willing to sign on to the statement should do so because the evidence, I think is very clear to just about anybody at this point that the United States is just willing to do anything, and that has to guide our decision our relations with the United States, because how can we possibly trust someone who's willing to do this kind of thing

to kidnap a president? What's to stop him? That could be the argument used anywhere, just to raise an allegation and get any rid of anybody who's inconvenient, And it really is dangerous. It's dangerous for the world. You know, the United States has a pure rival in China. Do they really want to provoke this kind of conflict with important allies of China in Latin America. I mean, this is the question that I think people in Washington also need to add themselves, and as well the people of

the United States. Is this the world they want to live in? Some of Donald Trump's support is due to his declaration of being a so called peace president, of not seeking new forever wars. This is hardly any different. Just because you're not invading the country doesn't mean that this isn't an act of war. Is this really what

the United States population was? And if this continues, if this has momentum, if they start doing this throughout the world, of course it's eventually going to produce an armed conflict directly with US forces, and that means that your children are going to be sent to be killed for wars for oil. We've been down this road before, and I think it's really time for us to shape up. This is the new reality. This is what it means to have Donald Trump and his like in the White House right now.

we will be back to our regular schedule. On Monday, Soger and I will be in studios, so we will see you then