| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
| That's a big upgrade. | ||
|
unidentified
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right? | |
| Washington Journal is next, and we want to hear from you. | ||
| Call in, text us at 202-748-8003. | ||
| Leave a Facebook comment at facebook.com slash C-SPAN or post on X using at C-SPAN-WJ. | ||
| Washington Journal starts now. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| It's Saturday, January 3rd. | ||
| At about 2 a.m. local time, U.S. forces launched attacks on Venezuela. | ||
| President Trump confirmed that Maduro and his wife have been captured and flown out of the country. | ||
| There is a news conference scheduled for 11 a.m. this morning from Mar-a-Lago that we will show you here on C-SPAN. | ||
| But until then, we'll get your reaction to the news on Venezuela. | ||
| Here's how to reach us. | ||
| Democrats, 202-748-8000. | ||
| Republicans, 202-748-8001. | ||
| And Independents, 202-748-8002. | ||
| You can send a text to 202-748-8003. | ||
| Include your first name in your city-state. | ||
| And we're on social media, facebook.com slash C-SPAN. | ||
| And X at C-SPANWJ. | ||
| Welcome to today's Washington Journal. | ||
| We're glad you're with us. | ||
| Let's start with that Truth Social post from President Trump. | ||
| He posted this at 4.21 a.m. this morning. | ||
| The United States of America has successfully carried out a large-scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicolas Maduro, who has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the country. | ||
| This operation was done in conjunction with U.S. law enforcement. | ||
| Details to follow. | ||
| There will be a news conference today at 11 a.m. at Mar-a-Lago. | ||
| And we will be showing you that news conference here on C-SPAN, so be sure to stay with us from that. | ||
| Well, the Venezuelan government also put out a statement. | ||
| Here's what they said according to CBS News. | ||
| Venezuela rejects, repudiates, and denounces before the international community the extreme, serious military aggression perpetrated by the current government of the United States of America against Venezuelan territory and people. | ||
| The whole country must be active to defeat this imperialist aggression. | ||
| They have declared a state of emergency. | ||
| We will keep our eye on any other news coming out of Venezuela as well and update you. | ||
| Here's a couple of posts on X from government officials, Secretary of State Marco Rubio retweeted a post that he put that he had posted in July of last year. | ||
| Maduro is not the president of Venezuela and his regime is not the legitimate government. | ||
| Maduro is the head of the Cartel de los Solas, a narco-terror organization which has taken possession of a country and he is under indictment for pushing drugs into the United States. | ||
| Haley Britzki is a CNN reporter who put this on X. | ||
| The Senate Armed Services Committee was not notified ahead of any potential military action tonight taken tonight in Venezuela, a source familiar says. | ||
| Here's Representative Jim McGovern. | ||
| He says, without authorization from Congress and the vast majority of Americans opposed to military action, Trump just launched an unjustified illegal strike on Venezuela. | ||
| He says, we don't have enough money for health care for Americans, but somehow we have unlimited funds for war. | ||
| Jim McGovern, he's a Democrat of Massachusetts. | ||
| This is Representative Maria Elvira-Salazar, who is a Republican of Florida. | ||
| The narco-terror imposed by the Maduro regime is over, thanks to the leadership of POTUS and Secretary Rubio. | ||
| Now it's time for the rightful leaders of Venezuela to restore freedom and rebuild the nation. | ||
| Tonight, a new cry of freedom echoes across the hemisphere, loud and clear. | ||
| Senator Andy Kim, a Democrat of New Jersey, says this: Secretaries Rubio and Hegseth looked every senator in the eye a few weeks ago and said this wasn't about regime change. | ||
| I didn't trust them then, and we see now that they blatantly lied to Congress. | ||
| Trump rejected our constitutionally required approval process for armed conflict. | ||
| And this is Representative Carlos Jimenez, who is a Republican of Florida. | ||
| January 3rd, 2026, a day we will never forget. | ||
| Senator Ruben Gallego, Democrat of Arizona, second unjustified war in my lifetime. | ||
| This war is illegal. | ||
| It's embarrassing that we went from world cop to the world bully in less than one year. | ||
| There is no reason for us to be at war with Venezuela. | ||
| And that is the reaction on Twitter. | ||
| Here is your reaction. | ||
| Let's start with Stephanie in Millersville, Maryland, Democrat. | ||
| Good morning, Stephanie. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| Just another example of how this administration will twist themselves into legal pretzels to justify this action. | ||
| And again, it underlines the hypocrisy and just downright ridiculousness of the president claiming to be a peace president. | ||
| And yeah, this will get him a Nobel Peace Prize. | ||
| It's mind-boggling, and it's being done in my name and everyone else's name out there who's listening, who may not want this to happen, who may not want poor people in leaky boats being bombed by drones. | ||
| Anybody can be designated a narco-terrorist in their book. | ||
| And Congress had better get off their hands and start taking action. | ||
| And Stephanie, what do you want Congress to do? | ||
| I want Congress to do something to actually be a co-equal branch of government rather than an obsequious knee-bending body. | ||
| The government, the Democrats are not in power, so I'm not sure what they could do. | ||
| But I cannot believe that the Speaker of the House will just stand by and the Senate majority leader will just stand by and let this happen. | ||
| All right, Stephanie, let's talk to Preston in Independent and Oxford, Ohio. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yeah, good morning. | |
| I would think you start grassroots, talk to people locally. | ||
| The world's a mess, but the most you can do if you're feeling frustrated is reach out to your community, try to build it up, try to find people who think the same way you do and make it better. | ||
| Anything specifically on Venezuela, Preston? | ||
|
unidentified
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Pretty much no. | |
| All right, Paul in Nampa, Idaho, Republican. | ||
| You're on the air, Paul. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yes, thank you for taking my call. | |
| There's three precedents that were held up, not held up, but cast by the Supreme Court. | ||
| And the first one was a gentleman that got kidnapped because he had gotten in with some bad people and he was kidnapped basically for his own life. | ||
| Another one was Adolf Eichmann. | ||
| I don't know if you remember what happened with the Eichmann story. | ||
| He was kidnapped by the Israelis and taken back to Israel when he was found in Argentina, one of the masterminds of the Third Reich and the destruction of Israel and all Jews. | ||
| They hung him. | ||
| So, Paul, bringing us to Venezuela, you're seeing that that's the same kind of thing, the Eichmann issue and Maduro? | ||
|
unidentified
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Yeah, it is. | |
| If you look at the past and the history, what the Supreme Court said, it is okay to do that. | ||
| It's not encouraged. | ||
| But the last one was Noriega, which was actually Maduro number one with Panama. | ||
| They did the same thing. | ||
| They went in and kidnapped him and took him out of there. | ||
| So it's not like I'm encouraging that type of behavior, but it's got to be done. | ||
| It's got to be done. | ||
| I mean, when you've got somebody that's poisoning the United States of America one by one, something's got to be done. | ||
| Okay, so mentioning Noriega, that is an article on Axios that says this. | ||
| Maduro's capture draws echoes of Noriega Noriega in 1990. | ||
| That would have been under George H.W. Bush, president at the time. | ||
| It says, what comes next is likely years of court battles over how Maduro is charged, how he's treated, and where he's held. | ||
| In December of 1989, the U.S. invaded Panama, accusing dictator Manuel Noriega of drug trafficking and other crimes. | ||
| Noriega surrendered in January of 1990 to American forces who brought him back to the U.S. for trial. | ||
| As opposed to the lightning fast seizure of Maduro, Noriega's capture took weeks, during which time he holed up at the Vatican's embassy. | ||
| U.S. troops notoriously blasted the embassy with loud rock music to annoy him into surrender. | ||
| Once in the U.S., Noriego fought a years-long court battle to be considered a prisoner of war rather than a common criminal. | ||
| We will continue to look at that, but that's at Axios if you'd like to continue reading that. | ||
| Sean is a Democrat in Hesperia, California. | ||
| Good morning, Sean. | ||
|
unidentified
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Good morning, Mimi. | |
| I am really appalled at what I woke up to. | ||
| And we need to stop when things happen. | ||
| Now we want to go to the past and talk about something and justify for what's happening. | ||
| I mean, that is not what we should be doing. | ||
| I mean, let's be real. | ||
| With the Union Confederate war, they should have hung the Confederates, but they let them go. | ||
| So we should stop going to the past and keep our mind focused on what's going on now. | ||
| In regards to Venezuela, this is a war crime. | ||
| I don't care what none of you Americans say. | ||
| This is a war crime. | ||
| Here it is. | ||
| We did not get Congress approval, not ran nothing by Congress, before we went into this country. | ||
| And they were dropping bombs in places over in this country. | ||
| So this is a war crime to me. | ||
| And also, secondly, we have a deranged president that I believe has dementia, sleepy Trump. | ||
| And then here it is. | ||
| Now we are going to attack the other countries. | ||
| And what is that saying to China? | ||
| China is probably looking like, oh, okay, let's go into Thailand now. | ||
| You know, America, especially our military. | ||
| If y'all want to fight someone, go and fight someone in war that wishes to bite you. | ||
| I don't see Trump going after the M23s over in Uganda that's murdering people over there and starving people. | ||
| So America, let's get it together. | ||
| This is a war crime. | ||
| Stop justifying this president and Congress needs to get back and file for impeachment now. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| All right. | ||
| And Sean is in Virginia, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yeah, good morning. | |
| This is a trying time for all them forward operations going on. | ||
| Let's pray for everything to get immediately calmed down over there. | ||
| Get the Secretary of State to do his job. | ||
| Get Congress back in yesterday, not today. | ||
| They should have already been involved in this. | ||
| And I pray for the troops on the ground, and they're very capable, but things can get out of hand really quickly if it's not planned correctly. | ||
| And God bless America. | ||
| God bless the people. | ||
| All right, Sean, let's hear from Kent in Erie, Illinois, Republican. | ||
|
unidentified
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Good morning. | |
| I have to kind of chuckle out of a couple of ladies that called this morning. | ||
| The last lady was so, she was just stricken with grief. | ||
| She said, well, he didn't go in front of Congress. | ||
| He didn't ask Congress. | ||
| Well, when Obama was in office and he was sending drones off to kill people all over everywhere, and Clinton was in office, you didn't hear any of these Democrats calling and asking how come they didn't ask Congress. | ||
| And before you let me go, when I hear these ladies talk about, you know, Trump, he's just a bad guy. | ||
| He calls people names. | ||
| He's rude. | ||
| He's crude. | ||
| This is the reason that women weren't allowed to vote in the first place. | ||
| Oh, come on, Kent. | ||
| Rick in Hardin, Kentucky, Democrat. | ||
| Good morning, Rick. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yeah, there's a law that was put in effect by Chuck Schumer that was put in the NB Defense Authorization Bill that allows what's going on happening, especially blowing up the drug boats. | |
| You can look that up, and it's in law. | ||
| And nobody, the Mockingbird media does not want to look into what exactly the legality of this problem has been. | ||
| So you said there's something in the NDAA that allows for military action against Venezuela? | ||
|
unidentified
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Chuck Schumer sponsored the law and put it in the bill. | |
| And it's in the bill in 1986. | ||
| 1986? | ||
|
unidentified
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Yes. | |
| Okay. | ||
|
unidentified
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Still in effect. | |
| Got it. | ||
| Stephen in Wyndham, Connecticut, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, Stephen. | ||
|
unidentified
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Hey, good morning. | |
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| I have two observations. | ||
| One, it was really a brilliant military operation. | ||
| They got in, they got out, they got their guy. | ||
| Two, we capture cartel heads all the time. | ||
| We got El Chafo in Mexico. | ||
| He said it was a drug organization. | ||
| So we're going to go back in there every month and capture new cartel heads. | ||
| I'm not into foreign wars after Iran and Iraq and Afghanistan. | ||
| So I think we got to be wary of what comes next. | ||
| Who is next? | ||
| Does this change anything? | ||
| Thanks. | ||
| Robert in Virginia Beach, Virginia, Republican. | ||
| Go ahead, Robert. | ||
|
unidentified
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Hey, morning. | |
| I just wanted to say that I am happy that Trump has done this. | ||
| I think he's making the world a better, safer place. | ||
| He's bringing law and order not only to the U.S., but also to foreign nations. | ||
| I have, you know, a handful of Venezuelan friends who have been texting me this morning, you know, that are very happy that this has happened. | ||
| They have, you know, had to seek asylum in places like Brazil and the Dominican Republic, you know, to get away from the violence that Maduro was causing. | ||
| So really, I just want to say thanks to Trump and to our American military for liberating Venezuela. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| God bless America. | ||
| So Robert, are you still there? | ||
|
unidentified
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Yes. | |
| What do your Venezuelan friends say about what they think might come next? | ||
| The previous caller just said, you know, it all depends on what comes next. | ||
| If one of his generals or the vice president take over, it could be just more of the same. | ||
|
unidentified
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Well, they're hoping that the woman that was elected will somehow take over, but that is yet to be seen, but that's what they're hoping for. | |
| And do they want to see more U.S. military action in Venezuela? | ||
|
unidentified
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And would you agree with that? | |
| I hadn't talked to them about that, but I feel like to really erase what's going on right now, it may be necessary. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Let's hear from Gary in Baltimore, Democrat. | ||
| Gary, go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
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Hi. | |
| Excuse me. | ||
| Hi. | ||
| Thanks for taking my call. | ||
| Could you please look up the Vulcan Elements Company on that iPad that you have? | ||
| It will help people understand what's going on. | ||
| The what elements, Gary? | ||
|
unidentified
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Excuse me, Vulcan. | |
| W-U-L-C-A-N Elements Company. | ||
| And see what just happened recently with them and see who's involved with that. | ||
| And let the viewers know so they understand the real reason these things are happening. | ||
| Thank you and Happy New Year. | ||
| Happy New Year to you. | ||
| This is John in Portland, Connecticut, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Mimi. | |
| Happy New Year. | ||
| To you as well. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Yeah, I'm pleased with what President Trump did. | ||
| We need to clean up the country, the world, and he's doing it. | ||
| And I'm all for him. | ||
| I agree with some of your callers earlier. | ||
| Some from Connecticut and a man from Virginia. | ||
| So I'm all in on it. | ||
| But it was one thing I got to ask you, Mimi. | ||
| From last week, there was a couple callers called in, kept repeating that Trump is a rapist and a pedophile. | ||
| President Trump is neither of those. | ||
| He's never been convicted or sentenced. | ||
| So stop promoting that. | ||
| And you should be saying something about it. | ||
| Here's Kent in Mingus, Texas. | ||
| Republican. | ||
| Go ahead, Kent. | ||
| Hi, thank you for having me on. | ||
| I'm not the same Kent that you heard from earlier. | ||
| That Kent somehow doesn't believe that women should have a right to vote. | ||
| But I'm like most Republicans. | ||
| I honor women's vote. | ||
| I honor the people who fought for suffrage. | ||
| And it's absolutely, absolutely foundation of the goodness of the country that we do allow people to vote of all races and both sexes. | ||
| And when it comes to Venezuela, Maduro sealed his fate by not acknowledging the people's choice to pick someone else for president. | ||
| He decided to stay in office. | ||
| This is what many people on the left side of politics think that Trump is up to. | ||
| They believe that he is going to stay president for life or whatever, which is preposterous, but there are a significant number of Democrats who really believe that. | ||
| And I don't dislike people for believing in a way that I don't think politically. | ||
| So, Kent, getting back to Venezuela, the argument is made that, you know, there are a lot of dictators that have seized power illegally, and the United States doesn't need to do anything about that. | ||
| Or what do you think of that? | ||
| What do you think of that argument? | ||
| Well, what I think about that argument is that the president took an oath to defend and protect the people of the United States. | ||
| And we've lost over 300,000 people the last few years to drug overdoses. | ||
| We have a drug glut. | ||
| We have a horrible drug problem in this country. | ||
| I think we're trying to get that under control. | ||
| I believe that's the main reason why Maduro was taken out. | ||
| Not just because he's a dictator. | ||
| That's a strong man staying in office because he's got the military on his side. | ||
| He's fighting against the people. | ||
| We have liberated, the good people of Venezuela, who voted for a moderate and not for Maduro. | ||
| We have liberated them. | ||
| And I think that America did the honorable thing, the right thing. | ||
| And people aren't going to like it. | ||
| Everyone's not going to agree. | ||
| But the only people who are my political enemies are the apathetic people who don't care about politics. | ||
| All right, Kent. | ||
| Got that. | ||
| Tony, a Democrat in Ottumwa, Iowa, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hello. | |
| How are you today? | ||
| How are you doing? | ||
| We're doing great. | ||
| Happy New Year to you. | ||
| Can you turn down your TV? | ||
| Yes. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| Go right ahead, Tony. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I say yes for what they did last night in Venezuela. | |
| I think that they've got to take care of that problem. | ||
| Also, I'd like to say the strike that they were going to do, the ISIS strike that they were going to do here in America. | ||
| I think that pretty much comes from who let the people over the border, like Harris and Biden. | ||
| Now we got them right in our country here trying to kill us. | ||
| But I want to say this, too. | ||
| To the man that said that women shouldn't vote, women are smarter than men. | ||
| We need our women vote. | ||
| They're the ones that keep us compliant. | ||
| Don't ever say that again about women voting. | ||
| All right, Tony. | ||
| Some news for you from CBS. | ||
| The European Union calls for restraint and respect for international law. | ||
| The top European Union diplomat said Saturday that she had spoken with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the EU's ambassador in Caracas. | ||
| She said the EU was, quote, closely monitoring the situation and noted that it had repeatedly stated that Mr. Maduro lacks legitimacy. | ||
| Quote, under all circumstances, the principles of international law and the U.N. Charter must be respected. | ||
| We call for restraint. | ||
| The safety of EU citizens in the country is our top priority. | ||
| Patrick in Brookings, Oregon, Independent Line, you're on the air, Patrick. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Happy New Year. | ||
| Hey, this is all about oil. | ||
| This doesn't got to do anything about drugs. | ||
| Else they'll be putting the users in guild as narco-terrorists. | ||
| It's about oil and see who's going to be running the oil fields in about a month, like they did in Iraq. | ||
| All right. | ||
| And this is Jerry in Brooklyn, New York, Republican. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, you know, I listen to Democrats, and I'm going to just shoot some common sense. | |
| You asked the question, what comes next? | ||
| I don't think that's up to anybody but the Venezuelan people and what they choose and how they want to live their lives. | ||
| That'll be up to them. | ||
| The reason why Maduro was captured was that there was a warrant for his arrest that was executed. | ||
| They snatched him and they grabbed him and he'll stand trial in a U.S. court. | ||
| You know, anything. | ||
| Jerry, how involved do you think the United States should be in those next steps? | ||
| In the, let's say, force an election, reinstate Machado. | ||
| Like, what do you think? | ||
| I guess reinstate is the wrong word, but place her as the president of Venezuela. | ||
| How involved should the United States be? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Look, there is a risk. | |
| There is a risk, but it's not up to us to decide. | ||
| And who's leading the country right now? | ||
| Who knows? | ||
| How it will turn out? | ||
| I don't know, but that's not our concern. | ||
| We grabbed Maduro for drug peddling and killing a lot of Americans and trying to destroy our country from within. | ||
| It's just my opinion. | ||
| But I think, and I hope that the justice will be served when he stands trial. | ||
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| All right, Jerry. | ||
| This is Martin in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Democrat. | ||
| What do you think, Martin? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I woke up this morning and I think our country has lost its mind entirely. | |
| I hear a lot of the callers are like all for this. | ||
| Does anybody remember all our other regime changes? | ||
| Do you think drugs are just coming from Venezuela? | ||
| This Donald Trump has had a hard one for this guy for some reason. | ||
| I know he's a bad guy. | ||
| Putin's a bad guy. | ||
| If I would have woke up this morning and they had captured Putin, I'd be doing the jig. | ||
| So to keep my train of thought here, number one, about the guy who called about the women voting, that is the Republican mind. | ||
| Women and blacks. | ||
| Let's stay on Venezuela. | ||
| So what do you make of the argument that hundreds of thousands of Americans have died from drug overdoses? | ||
| And this is capturing Maduro and removing him from power is protecting American lives. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Did you ever see the movie when Reagan was selling arms for drugs? | |
| Drugs are a problem in South America. | ||
| Every country should kidnap all the presidents down there. | ||
| And drugs should be treated as a health issue, not a drug issue. | ||
| You're never going to wear in the drawer war on drugs as long as people want them. | ||
| You need to use it as a health issue. | ||
| That's what I say about the drug thing. | ||
| I understand what you're pushing on people, but drugs have been going on forever. | ||
| You got to treat it as a health issue. | ||
| If you have bad actors around the world, where's Tony Blinken? | ||
| Where are the real people who can talk and think logically and make sense without wars and weapons? | ||
| I'm totally against this. | ||
| We went down the wrong road. | ||
| Thank you for your time. | ||
| Greg, an independent in Ypsilanti, Michigan. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, good morning. | |
| Previous caller, Stole My Thunder. | ||
| This really isn't about drugs. | ||
| It's about oil. | ||
| Venezuela provides oil to China and to India. | ||
| Okay, this is an economic push, and drugs are just the pretense that the United States is using, right? | ||
| In order to. | ||
| And, Greg, why are you that? | ||
| Why do you think that this is about oil? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, like I said, Venezuela provides oil to China and to India. | |
| Who are our biggest economic threats right now? | ||
| It's India and China. | ||
| Would you agree? | ||
| All right. | ||
| And here is Mike in Bowie, Maryland, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, Mike. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, good morning, Mamie. | |
| How are you? | ||
| Good. | ||
| Yes, I have just one question. | ||
| Why was the former president of Honduras pardon? | ||
| Never, it's all about drugs. | ||
| I don't want to say it. | ||
| And I also agree with a lot of the other independent callers. | ||
| I think it is about the resources of Venezuela. | ||
| And you have a great day and a great new year. | ||
| Happy New Year to you. | ||
| David, Fort Worth, Texas, Democrat. | ||
| Good morning, David. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I think it's all about oil. | |
| America have a drug culture. | ||
| They'll never be able to stop it. | ||
| You could go out right now in the street. | ||
| You probably can buy cocaine, crack. | ||
| You can buy anything you want. | ||
| By him invading that country, I think that's even part of white supremacy. | ||
| And Kevin, Staten Island, New York, Republican. | ||
| You're on the air, Kevin. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Good morning. | ||
| I believe, and I support Mr. President Trump and JD Vance and Pete Hagett's move to take him out. | ||
| It's a matter of deconomics, yes, and it's a matter of acts of genocide, which these drugs are committing. | ||
| It's not only in our country, it's their country, and we are looked upon as the sole international police country because every time something happens, why didn't America step in? | ||
| Well, these people in Venezuela are being terrorized by this individual. | ||
| An individual who was elected to office was ran out of the country. | ||
| And it goes to show you that our actions in the future are going to be justified. | ||
| I mean, I am a former member of the intelligence community who served overseas in the United States Navy. | ||
| And I believe and solely support what they did because without this action, this action is going to send a message to every other country that, hey, if you don't stop what you're doing, this is what's going to happen. | ||
| So, Kevin, I want to ask you, since you said you're a member of the intelligence community and served in the Navy, the echoes of regime change from Iraq, that as you know how that turned out. | ||
| What's your response to that as far as that this could escalate into something much bigger and much more complicated? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Professionally, my professional opinion, I don't think it's going to escalate. | |
| I think a lot of people are going to sit down and weigh the factors that are in place right now and say, hey, listen, you know, Donald Trump made the right move. | ||
| Vice President Vance is a Marine and is the advisor to the president. | ||
| And I'm sure JD Vance doesn't like war either. | ||
| I mean, Marines and the Navy work very closely together. | ||
| We train together. | ||
| And we're not trained to fortify war. | ||
| We're trained to get a fast resolution to a problem and eliminate that problem. | ||
| I don't think. | ||
| And this is the Wall Street Journal that says this. | ||
| Who is Nicolas Maduro? | ||
| 63-year-old strongman, has been president of Venezuela since 2013, following the death of his predecessor and mentor, Hugo Chavez. | ||
| It says, Trump officials say that Maduro leads the so-called cartel of the sons to flood the U.S. with drugs and is an illegitimate president because of a 2024 election that the Venezuelan opposition and elections monitors say he stole. | ||
| Maduro denies wrongdoing. | ||
| Maduro and his inner circle, who over the years have called themselves revolutionaries, have been reluctant to cede power, partly because of the U.S. criminal indictments and international sanctions they face out of office. | ||
| Maduro withstood Trump's efforts to oust him through a so-called maximum pressure campaign in 2019. | ||
| Maduro said this to his supporters late last year, quote, they'll never be able to remove us from the path to revolution. | ||
| Victory forever, victory forever, victory forever. | ||
| Stan in Esopus, New York, Independent Line, good morning. | ||
| Yeah, that guy kind of stole my thunder. | ||
| He pardoned a guy who brought 400 tons of drugs into here from Honduras. | ||
| And I think Taiwan is watching this, and I think China's watching this. | ||
| They're going to probably attack Taiwan now because this is crazy. | ||
| He's been bombing these boats for about a month now. | ||
| Wait, Stan, what are you seeing as the relationship between China invading Taiwan and this military action? | ||
|
unidentified
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I think that, well, they're waiting. | |
| They're waiting. | ||
| They've got the ships going around there. | ||
| They're flying over it. | ||
| They've been flying over for the last couple of weeks. | ||
| They got all their ships over there, and we got all our ships over the head away. | ||
| This isn't about drugs because he pardoned a guy that brought 400 tons of drugs in. | ||
| He pardoned a couple other people that was arrested for drug dealing. | ||
| And he pardoned over 1,600 people. | ||
| So I don't know where he's going, but all that money, these little boats over there, wasted. | ||
|
unidentified
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We could have been using it somewhere else. | |
| I knew it was coming because I watched a long time ago out in California when JD Vance was out there. | ||
| They were practicing it. | ||
|
unidentified
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I seen it coming because I watched the boats come in. | |
| I watched the planes go over. | ||
|
unidentified
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And then there was things that the troops jump out. | |
| I was watching it when he was over in California. | ||
|
unidentified
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They were practicing this thing. | |
| I knew it was coming. | ||
| All right, Stan. | ||
| And take a look at an interview that was from this past Friday. | ||
| This is Senator Chris Coons, Democrat of Delaware. | ||
| He was asked about the president's actions in Venezuela. | ||
| Obviously, this is before the action that happened last night. | ||
|
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But in Venezuela, he's been sleepwalking without a clear policy or a clear path forward into a conflict with one of our hemisphere's most capable authoritarian regimes. | |
| Has this really been about interdicting drugs? | ||
| Maduro's willing to negotiate about stopping the regime's support for drug trafficking. | ||
| Is this about access to oil? | ||
| That is something President Trump's talked about. | ||
| And his chief of staff, Susie Wiles, admitted in a Vanity Fair article that, frankly, this is about regime change. | ||
| In neither case, does it make sense with no plan for what would come next for us to use American soldiers and military force to directly try to overthrow Maduro? | ||
| That was from Friday, yesterday on MSNE. | ||
| We got a tweet from Attorney General Pam Bondi, who posted this about 10 minutes ago. | ||
| Nicholas Maduro and his wife Celia Flores have been indicted in the Southern District of New York. | ||
| Nicholas 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 in American courts. | ||
| On behalf of the entire USDOJ, I would like to thank President Trump for having the courage to demand accountability on behalf of the American people. | ||
| And a huge thank you to our brave military who conducted the incredible and highly successful mission to capture these two alleged international narco-traffickers. | ||
| That is a tweet from Attorney General Pam Bondi. | ||
| We're taking your calls throughout this program on the situation in Venezuela. | ||
| Overnight, U.S. forces conducted strikes and captured President Maduro and his wife and flew them out of the country. | ||
| Talking now to Steve in Louisville, Kentucky. | ||
| Democrat, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
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Oh, hello. | |
| Good morning, team. | ||
| Yes, I'm a lifelong Democrat. | ||
| I don't agree with everything that Trump has done, nor did I with Biden. | ||
| But I will say this. | ||
| I've seen firsthand what drugs does to the community, what it does to the people. | ||
| I applaud Trump, his bravery, his courage for going in and doing something, trying to attempt to do something about it. | ||
| Anytime you stop a boat, an ounce of drugs from coming in the country, you're saving lives. | ||
| And I've said for years that we should send troops in to these areas in these countries. | ||
| Too much red tape to go through with Congress and all that. | ||
| So I'm full blessing with Trump for making the decision to go in. | ||
| All right, Steve, let's talk to Robert next. | ||
| Lynchburg, Virginia, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, Robert. | ||
|
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Good morning, Mimi, and I hope you let me finish this. | |
| I don't agree with the move that President Trump made on Venezuela last night. | ||
| I wonder all these people that call in there, especially Republican, about they agree with him. | ||
| And anyone that agree with him, have you got a son in the military? | ||
| I did 20 years, from 64 to 84. | ||
| And then Trump, he should be captured for killing a million people during the COVID-19. | ||
| Why wouldn't someone come over to America and capture him? | ||
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| And Randy in Mesa, Arizona, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, Randy. | ||
|
unidentified
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Good morning. | |
| I disagree with what Trump has done. | ||
| He says it's about drugs, but he lets drug dealers be pardoned. | ||
| No, he has forced us into war. | ||
| He's actually done exactly what Putin did in Ukraine. | ||
| He needs to be impeached. | ||
| And here is the Venezuelan ambassador to the UN. | ||
| He took aim at U.S. policy towards his country. | ||
| This is from this past Tuesday. | ||
| Truth is brutal and criminal. | ||
| The U.S. government is threatening an armed attack against Venezuela to satisfy the big oil corporations, particularly Canoco Phillips and ExxonMobil Mugo, Which are pioneers in the theft of Venezuelan oil. | ||
| The children of American families will be ordered to risk their lives to line the pockets of oil company shareholders with billions of dollars while thousands of Venezuelan and American families are destroyed. | ||
| It is blood for oil. | ||
| Blood for oil is not a noble proposition. | ||
| It is unworthy and unacceptable. | ||
| War for oil is a death sentence. | ||
| The same one offered to Iraq, Syria, Libya, and so many others. | ||
| The behavior of the U.S. government confirms a cynical phrase of the propaganda of wars for oil, which states that, and I quote, it is unfortunate that God has placed the oil of the United States in the territory of other nations. | ||
| End of quote. | ||
| It's a war of plunder and pillage with a flag taken from the pit of human values. | ||
| That was the Venezuelan ambassador to the UN speaking through an interpreter. | ||
| We're taking your calls throughout this program on the actions in Venezuela, U.S. actions in Venezuela. | ||
| The numbers are on your screen. | ||
| Democrats are on 2027488,000. | ||
| Republicans 2027488001. | ||
| And Independents 2027488002. | ||
| Let's talk to Cornell in New Jersey. | ||
| Democrat, good morning. | ||
| Good morning, Mamie. | ||
| I'm elated that so many people are aware and not buying the fact that it's about drugs. | ||
| It was never about drugs. | ||
| It was never about this last election because Venezuela has been thriving until we put sanctions on them over a decade ago. | ||
|
unidentified
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It is about the oil. | |
| And when we started, and when we started pirating their oil last week or the week before, I realized here we go again, weapons of mass destruction again. | ||
| But I'm elated that so many people, and it's unfortunate that they will buy, they will buy that it was about drugs by President Trump just pardon a drug lord. | ||
|
unidentified
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The hypocrisy on steroids is just off the charts. | |
| And Congress, that's another thing. | ||
|
unidentified
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They've taken Congress out of the equation. | |
| We're paying Congress $174,000 a year plus benefits. | ||
|
unidentified
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Well, the Republicans, they just stayed home instead of coming to the table to negotiate. | |
| And it's just hypocrisy on steroids, Mamie. | ||
| All right, Cornell, let's take a look at what Senator Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas, said on X. Nicholas Maduro wasn't just an illegitimate dictator. | ||
| He also ran a vast drug trafficking operation. | ||
| That's why he was indicted in U.S. court nearly six years ago for drug trafficking and narcoterism. | ||
| I just spoke to Secretary Rubio, who confirmed that Maduro is in U.S. custody. | ||
| Rene in Cathedral City, California, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
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Hey, good morning. | |
| How are you doing? | ||
| Good. | ||
|
unidentified
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Hey, turns out from what I heard from the last caller, I was listening to his position on the drug marketing, whatever. | |
| Here's my position as an independent. | ||
| I think it's not the right thing to do to go into a country, independent country, and take over their leadership. | ||
| I mean, there are people in that country who vote for their leadership, just like we do here. | ||
| And I'm surprised that that's the big thing, the main so Renee, what many election observers said was that Maduro stole the election, that he is not the legitimate leader. | ||
|
unidentified
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Gee whiz, we heard that back in 2020. | |
| Did we not? | ||
| And here's Jerry in New Jersey, Democrat. | ||
| Hi, Jerry. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yeah, hello. | |
| Good morning. | ||
| Listen, I'm in shock. | ||
| I really am. | ||
| The heroism of our military and the fact that they could go in there. | ||
| And by the way, you do realize that not one, we didn't lose one military taking this guy out. | ||
| Now, I understand it was a $50 million thing on his head. | ||
| He was not the legitimate president of this country. | ||
| So what we did was exactly the right thing. | ||
| I listened to the Democrats, and it's funny, you've got coons on there, and he swore that Biden was with it. | ||
| So I trust him like I trust a hole in the head. | ||
| And you're also a Democrat, Jerry, or are you calling on the wrong line? | ||
|
unidentified
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No, no, I'm a registered Democrat. | |
| I actually voted for Biden. | ||
| I did not vote for Harris. | ||
| I voted for Obama. | ||
| I am a registered Democrat, but I am extremely proud of the U.S. right now. | ||
| I really am. | ||
| And as far as the oil goes, when I listen to the other Democrat callers, they got to remember this oil was going to Russia. | ||
| It was going to China. | ||
| And it was, you can't imagine what this is going to do. | ||
| And by the way, I don't want to be the Mexican president and the Colombian president right now thinking to themselves, oh my God. | ||
| Because let me tell you something, what a message this sends to those people that think that they can get away with the drug peddling and the making the money on the drugs and killing the U.S. citizens. | ||
| You know, I listened to the Democrats and they really think this is not good, but I don't get it. | ||
| I see them defending criminals, illegals, Maduro. | ||
| What is going on? | ||
| My party has lost it. | ||
| I mean, they sincerely have lost it. | ||
| And the media, even you guys, you should be cheering this, but no. | ||
| You want to find a way to make it a negative, especially because Trump did it. | ||
| So, Jerry, Jerry, I want to show you, since you mentioned Colombia and the president of Colombia, I want to show you this from the New York Times. | ||
| It says, Colombia's president Gustavo Petro said on social media that his country's forces were being deployed to the border with Venezuela and that there would be additional support, quote, in the event of a massive influx of refugees. | ||
| Ernest in Kalamazoo, Michigan, Republican, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yes, me personally, I'm from a red line neighborhood, born and raised. | |
| So I know personally, I understand politics all the way. | ||
| I know drugs is politics as well as everything else, but I know personally what drugs have been doing in neighborhoods. | ||
| I feel like our only terrorist, our true terrorists in America is white supremacists and drugs. | ||
| We are not dealing with really nothing else, especially when they come to red line communities. | ||
| I think somebody needs to do something about it, especially with the drugs coming into our community. | ||
| You know, everybody's talking about what drugs do to the neighborhoods, but the average neighborhood drug dealer, they're nothing but a foot soldier, you know. | ||
| And to the drugs coming to our neighborhood from somewhere else, which is usually overseas, our neighborhood would never be affected by it. | ||
| So I feel like what Trump's doing, it needs to be done. | ||
| And I feel like also something needs to be done about the white supremacists, like Trump said, too, because that is our only terrorist in America. | ||
| Here's Don in Elk Grove Village, Illinois, Independent Line. | ||
| Hi, Don. | ||
| You're on the air. | ||
| Hi, yeah. | ||
| Yeah, the thing is, Maduro, they let all those criminals out of Venezuela, and the Democrats welcomed them in here, no problem, just like when Jimmy Carter let the Cuban criminals in there. | ||
| And see, over a million Americans have been killed because of drugs. | ||
| And a lot of those drugs were going to Europe, too, so actually doing Europe a favor. | ||
| Now, Maduro was a puppet for the Chinese and the Russians. | ||
| And the China made a statement in 1998. | ||
| They said that they would take over the world without firing a shot. | ||
| And what they're doing is they're having America be weakened by all these drugs and all this nonsense. | ||
| And we're killing ourselves. | ||
| They've already killed a million people and Americans. | ||
| I mean, how many Americans died in World War II? | ||
| Half a million? | ||
| You know, this is people got to wake up and look at America. | ||
| Trump wants some, I mean, Trump wants to have America be strong. | ||
| Camilla would have just let more and more people in here. | ||
| And look at all the fraud in all the states now. | ||
| Minnesota, Illinois, New York, all the billions of dollars they spent on illegal aliens, they could have easily given for AC, the insurance premiums for the Americans. | ||
| The Democrats are just looking for more votes when the Democrats, when these people become citizens, they don't care about Americans. | ||
| See, people don't realize the Democrats and Republicans are like businesses. | ||
| Whoever wins gets in control of the budget. | ||
| And that's the bottom line. | ||
| It's about the money. | ||
| The Democrats don't care about people. | ||
| They care about votes so they can make their friends richer. | ||
| And the same thing with the Republic. | ||
| All right, Don, and this is Randy, a Democrat in Iron River, Michigan. | ||
| Go ahead, Randy. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Mimi. | |
| Mimi, I'm a Democrat, but I do want to thank you and C-SPAN. | ||
| Last month, about 25 days ago or so, you had a guy come on and talk about all drug policies and alcohol policies in the United States. | ||
| You had that specialist come on, and he said that there's 178,000 people that died from alcohol. | ||
| 83,000 people died last year from all drugs combined. | ||
| One drug, alcohol. | ||
| Are we going to have somebody come into our country and start killing all the people that are selling all this alcohol? | ||
| I mean, you look across, we averaged 375 people that died this last weekend over the weekend from Christmas to New Year's Day. | ||
| We averaged 375 people a weekend died just from that one drug, alcohol. | ||
| Now, don't you think that the rest of these countries should start bombing us? | ||
| We're selling the worst drug in the world to all the rest of the world, but that's okay because those are white guys that drink that. | ||
| If it was a brown or a black guy that wanted alcohol to be legal, it would be illegal. | ||
| We'd have made it illegal the first day. | ||
| But because white people do it, it's legal. | ||
| And let's be honest. | ||
| That's what it's about. | ||
| It's about race. | ||
| But I want to thank C-SPAN again for coming on and having that guy that come out and show everybody what I've been calling in and telling you how many times in a row that alcohol is the most dangerous drug by far. | ||
| All right, Randy, and all of our programs you can find on our website, c-span.org. | ||
| If you miss any of our Washington Journal segments, you can find them there. | ||
| Rose in Tennessee, Republican, you're on the air, Rose. | ||
|
unidentified
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Thank you for taking my call. | |
| I want us to keep in mind that Donald J. Trump just pardoned Honduras President Juan Hernandez, who is guilty of drug trafficking 400 tons of cocaine and arms smuggling and was working with the Sinaloa cartel. | ||
| Why did he do that? | ||
| Peter Thiel's Prospera baby farm in Honduras is set to replace Zorro Ranch. | ||
| Now, Venezuela is not a part of the United States as far as I know. | ||
| I look at my map. | ||
| I don't see it anywhere in the United States. | ||
| So remove the bases for starters. | ||
| Stop using the CIA for regime change. | ||
| If Donald J. Trump really wanted to end child sex trafficking and drug trafficking, he would certainly gut the CIA. | ||
| No, this is about stealing oil reserves and is part of the manifest destiny plan of the Council on Foreign Ruination. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| This is what the New York Times has. | ||
| Venezuela's Attorney General, Tarek William Saab, made televised remarks condemning the U.S. attacks. | ||
| Quote, innocent victims have been mortally wounded and others killed by this criminal terrorist attack. | ||
| He said, called for people to take to the streets with calm and vigilance. | ||
| He also repeated demands that other officials have made for proof that Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Celia Flores, were alive. | ||
| Nicole Providence, Rhode Island, Democrat, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
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Good morning. | |
| I just wanted to say that I was in middle school when 9-11 happened, and that shook my world, obviously. | ||
| But this is another earth-shattering moment for myself. | ||
| One of the things that they kept binging into us is weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. | ||
| We have to go there too. | ||
| This is just the new generation of it. | ||
| Same playbook, same everything. | ||
| We have, yeah, we do have a drug problem. | ||
| Pardoning people that bring in drugs like presidents we like isn't solution, and neither is this. | ||
| This is going to bring more death, more suffering. | ||
| We want to focus on making America healthy, Americans healthy. | ||
| Maybe we should do things at home and not try to distract from other things like the Epstein files by invading Venezuela. | ||
| Thank you so much for covering this and have a good day. | ||
| Thank you, Nicole. | ||
| And here's Representative Carlos Jimenez of Florida who says this. | ||
| I have just spoken to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. | ||
| President Trump has changed the course of history in our hemisphere. | ||
| Our country and the world are safer for it. | ||
| Today's decisive action in this hemisphere is equivalent to the fall of the Berlin Wall. | ||
| Wonder what you think about that. | ||
| We're getting your reaction to the strike in Venezuela, military strikes, and the capturing of President Nicolas Maduro and his wife and them being flown out of the country. | ||
| We'll talk to Gregory next in Louisiana, Independent Line. | ||
| You're on the air, Gregory. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, everyone. | |
| It is crazy to see what Trump did, man, because it is Repeat of history. | ||
| I condemn this with all my heart, man. | ||
| I'm a retired disabled vet myself. | ||
| And prior to the Iraq war, I was stationed in Fort Bliss, Texas in 1977. | ||
| And we were training the Iraqis to attack Iran. | ||
| And we told them that we would have their back. | ||
| We trained them right there in Fort Bliss, Texas. | ||
| Once they were trained up, we trained them with the chemical weapons and everything, the very weapons that they claimed that they had, or weapons of mass destruction. | ||
| We were training them with that, with all, we gave them all that stuff. | ||
| And we were training them with all that stuff right here in America. | ||
| And here we go again with Trump with this craziness. | ||
| And it's absolutely about the oil and the fear, defeat his eagle. | ||
| Because he wanted to be like Putin. | ||
| He wanted to be like Kim Jong-un. | ||
| He wanted to be like Chi. | ||
| And that is one of the reasons why he went to Venezuela to give Russia cover for what they're doing in Ukraine and to give cover to Israel for what they're doing in Gaza. | ||
| And it is a total disgrace that he needs to be impeached. | ||
| And the Congress, the GOP, is also in violation of their oath because the oath is defending this country against all enemies, foreign and domestic. | ||
| And right now, the GOP is a domestic terrorist group because they've been backing all this stuff. | ||
| That's all I have. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| And this is Jeff in King, North Carolina, Republican line. | ||
| Good morning, Jeff. | ||
| Well, hello, I mean, I am one proud American today. | ||
|
unidentified
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We finally have a commander-in-chief and a secretary of war that's got the ball to actually really try to win the war on drugs. | |
| Now, he could have went in and killed Madora and his wife, but we captured him, okay? | ||
|
unidentified
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And the guy in Honduras that Trump pardons, the people say he was framed by the cartels of that country. | |
| They blamed it on him. | ||
| That's why he was pardoned. | ||
| And did you forget that Biden opened up the southern border and let over 300,000 people die from drugs? | ||
| One of them, including my daughter, my 36-year-old only child, died from fit milk poison. | ||
| So this is payback for my daughter. | ||
| And I am so proud of you, Mr. President. | ||
| And thank you. | ||
| And if anybody needs to be impeached, and that's Obama and Bob, because they're both traitors, thank you. | ||
| This is from CBS News with this, sorry, Washington, The Wall Street Journal. | ||
| It says this. | ||
| One tanker that had been headed toward Venezuela to load up on crude oil diverted away from the country following the U.S. strikes and is now headed to Nigeria, while another four that were sailing to the Latin American country are now stationary, according to vessel tracking data. | ||
| The tanker that is now headed to Nigeria is the Chinese-owned 1000 Sunny, a supertanker that has been moving Venezuelan oil to China over the past five years. | ||
| It had been on course to Venezuela since mid-December, despite President Trump's declaration of a complete blockade on December 16th. | ||
| The other four tankers are run by companies that have been sanctioned by the U.S. Bernard in New York, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
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Hi, good morning. | |
| Okay, here's what I want to say. | ||
| I'm calling on the Republican line. | ||
| When Stalin said we will conquer America and we will use useful idiots, we won't have to fire a shot. | ||
| The useful idiots are on the democratic line. | ||
| They are complicit in helping the left wing destroy this country. | ||
| Now, here's what's going on: the drugs are only a part of it. | ||
| There's a political element here. | ||
| Everything that the communists can use to destroy America is the propaganda that comes from the fake news, is the political aspects. | ||
| The Democratic Party, for instance, got Daniel Otega elected in Nicaragua. | ||
| They drew a party for this vicious man in New York down Fifth Avenue. | ||
| This is the Democratic Party. | ||
| This is now. | ||
| This is a political problem. | ||
| It's twofold. | ||
| The drugs that are being used to destroy our youth and brainwash them in our schools is part of the agenda to take over America by the left. | ||
| We now have a socialist in New York City. | ||
| Most of the useful idiots that are calling in on the Democratic mind, they don't understand. | ||
| Socialism was the ideology of Nazi Germany. | ||
| It was called the Socialistic Party of Germany. | ||
| They don't, they are sophisticated. | ||
| In other words, they believe in sophistry, which the dictionary says to come to an intellectual idea without using logic, reasoning, or facts. | ||
| So these people are brainwashed totally. | ||
| They are hurting America. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| Bernard, we got that point. | ||
| Here is Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. | ||
| This is from December 16th. | ||
| He was speaking about the Pentagon's efforts against suspected drug boats and the information that they are sharing with Congress. | ||
| This is the 22nd bipartisan briefing we've had on a highly successful mission to counter designated terrorist organizations, cartels, bringing weapons, weapons, meaning drugs, to the American people and poisoning the American people for far too long. | ||
| So we're proud of what we're doing, able to lay it out very directly to these senators and soon to the House. | ||
| It's all classified. | ||
| We can't talk about it now. | ||
| We're also going to tomorrow allow the Hask and SASC to see the unedited video of the September 2nd alongside with Admiral Bradley, who has done a fantastic job, has made all the right calls, and we're glad he'll be there to do it. | ||
| But in keeping with long-standing Department of War policy, Department of Defense policy, of course, we're not going to release a top-secret, full, unedited video of that to the general public. | ||
| Hask and SASC and appropriate committees will see it, but not the general public. | ||
| That was December 16th. | ||
| That was Secretary Hagseth, Secretary of Defense. | ||
| And we're taking your calls. | ||
| Let's talk to Stephanie, Grover, North Carolina, Republican. | ||
| Hi, Stephanie. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| Good morning, Mimi. | ||
| So I have two. | ||
| So I have two comments. | ||
| Please don't cut me off. | ||
| So speaking of the vessels out in the Atlantic, there's also another one called the Bella One. | ||
| And they literally were trying, like we tried to stop them. | ||
| And they had like no flag flying. | ||
| And they literally hung off the side of their ship after they got the OK from Russia. | ||
| It is about oil, not because we need their oil, but because we don't want other countries to have their oil. | ||
| And secondly, I would just like to say, I think we all remember the crack pandemic back in the 80s. | ||
| Well, crack comes from cocaine. | ||
| And I don't care whether it's fentanyl, cocaine, marijuana. | ||
| I don't care what it is. | ||
| I say we need to get rid of all of it. | ||
| And I would just like to say that crack ruined my family's life. | ||
| I am an orphan because of crack cocaine. | ||
| And do you know who was selling the crack to my mother? | ||
| Black people were. | ||
| And so basically, I would just like to say to everybody in this country, you know, you need to stay away from drugs. | ||
| And if you are supporting any kind of anything that has to do with drugs, shame on you. | ||
| And frankly, if you don't like what's going on in our country, then you need to pack your bags and you need to go to these other countries that you're crying over. | ||
| And let's see how you fare over there because you're probably going to either up getting killed or imprisoned in some filthy third world country. | ||
| And, you know, everybody's complaining and crying about Russia. | ||
| You know, Russia is. | ||
| Let's be hard on Russia. | ||
| Well, you know, that oil tanker, the Bella One, Russia's wanting that oil. | ||
| Venezuela is basically in bed with all of our enemies, you know. | ||
| And frankly, this whole thing is just sad. | ||
| And I would just like to say to all the Democrats, just think about it this way. | ||
| We're trying to save Joe Biden's son, who was smoking crack on the hood of his car after he lied about trying to get an application for a gun. | ||
| So, you know, I don't know what to tell them. | ||
| But it's pretty sad that we seriously have people in this country right now who are complaining and debating whether we're stopping them for fentanyl or cocaine. | ||
| Really? | ||
| Are we really going to nitpick which drug we're going to go after? | ||
| I don't care what drug we go after. | ||
| Let's just get it. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Let's talk to Larry in Illinois, line for Democrats. | ||
| You're on the air, Larry. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Thank you for taking my call. | ||
| You know, I'm really surprised. | ||
| Well, no, I really can't be surprised as to what goes on in the world today. | ||
| But have they thought it out who's going to be the next leader of Venezuela? | ||
| Will it be that woman that won the Nobel Peace Prize who was the legitimate winner of the election? | ||
| You know, what are the next steps? | ||
| That's all I have to say. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| This is Rip in Fredericksburg, Virginia, Republican. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Morning. | |
| You know, way to go, military. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Way to go. | |
| You really knocked it out of the park. | ||
| This was really big time. | ||
| You did just the right thing. | ||
| And drugs are just the scourge of everything that is worth anything. | ||
| And go see Clay Huber, who is one of the greatest men in Fredericksburg, one of the greatest fathers ever lost his son to fentanyl. | ||
| Go talk to him. | ||
| And if it's oil, yeah, maybe it is partially oil. | ||
| Doesn't mean that it only has to be one thing. | ||
| It can be drugs. | ||
| It can be oil. | ||
| It can be corruption. | ||
| It can be sex trade. | ||
| It can be all those things. | ||
| Maduro is a monster and was in, you know, if I ran the country, I can't say what I would say because you'd cut me off, but they wouldn't be around. | ||
| And I just want to tell everybody the main thing that the United States needs to do is to take every single illegal immigrant, put a price tag on what it costs us to take care of them, go to that country and delete it from the deficit that we owe them. | ||
| And that's the way their country will keep their people from coming into this country. | ||
| We're crowded. | ||
| We're distorted. | ||
| We're ignorant. | ||
| And I think that you guys need to have one of those things that Jim Kramer has in front of him where when something happens, he hits it and makes a sound. | ||
| And when Democrats come on, you need to hit it. | ||
| And he goes, cuckoo. | ||
| Stephen, Lexington, Kentucky, Independent Line. | ||
| Hi, Stephen. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning. | |
| That last caller is the cuckoo. | ||
| Like, what is he talking about? | ||
| It's just disgusting. | ||
| It truly is a vile thing to say that round up all the immigrants and let's just count how much each person costs. | ||
| Like, have some humanity. | ||
| Clearly, this administration is a war regime. | ||
| They changed the name to the Department of War. | ||
| They were telling you what they were going to do. | ||
| They didn't even get approval to do this. | ||
| And now what? | ||
| Now it's going to be like Cuba all over again. | ||
| Let's do Nicaragua all over again in the 50s and 60s. | ||
| Like, this is just an instigation to start a bigger thing. | ||
| It's ridiculous. | ||
| It feels a little weird. | ||
| You know, I'm not Venezuelan, but I am Latino, so I look like these people. | ||
| So what's next, guys? | ||
| You're going to round me up. | ||
| I'm a U.S. citizen, but I don't look like you guys, Mr. Dude, that guy was disgusting before me. | ||
| And the sad thing is that there's people just like that gentleman that think like that openly. | ||
| It's gross. | ||
| The United States, if anything, the Native Americans should have taken all the white people out. | ||
| That's how it is. | ||
| All right, Stephen. | ||
| And this is the Washington Post with this question: What could happen next in Venezuela? | ||
| It says it remains unclear what will happen next in Venezuela according to Venezuela's Constitution. | ||
| If the president is absent during the first year of his term, elections must be held for a new president within 30 days. | ||
| The vice president would take office on an interim basis until a new president is elected. | ||
| If the government holds and follows the Constitution, Vice President Rodriguez would become interim president. | ||
| That is from the Washington Post. | ||
| And here's Linda, Sycamore, Illinois. | ||
| Democrat, good morning. | ||
| Linda, are you there? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, yes. | |
| I was not expected to be called on. | ||
| That's what happens when you're on hold on Washington Journal. | ||
| Go ahead, Linda. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Stephanie, I have to admire your patience and courage for doing this this morning. | |
| I would like to stick with statistics. | ||
| Yes, more people in the United States are dying from fentanyl and drug overdoses. | ||
| Most of the fentanyl is coming from China and Mexico. | ||
| So we're going to bomb China and Mexico next. | ||
| Number two, firearms are the first leading cause in children from age 1 to 19. | ||
| This is something that we could. | ||
| Go ahead, Linda. | ||
| We're listening. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm muting myself. | |
| Sorry. | ||
| Back to fentanyl and coming from China and Mexico. | ||
| The justification for Trump bombing Venezuela is not a justification at all. | ||
| There are other ways that we can express our power and dominance in the world. | ||
| This is not it. | ||
| Thank you, and have a good day. | ||
| And here's John Newsimerna Beach, Florida, Republican. | ||
| John, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, and I want to thank C-SPAN for allowing such spirited debate. | |
| I don't agree with some of your callers, but it's great to hear both sides. | ||
| I just want to say it's a great day for the Venezuelan people. | ||
| Maria Machado would make a great president, return democracy to the people. | ||
| And at one time, Venezuela was a rich country. | ||
| And I think the people should benefit from their own oil. | ||
| And like I said, I think Maria Machado would make a great president. | ||
| It's kind of, excuse me, it's kind of odd that the news media doesn't cover her that much anymore. | ||
| And could that be because she said so many nice things about President Trump? | ||
| I don't know. | ||
| But I hope she does become the next president of Venezuela. | ||
| And thank you so much for taking my call today. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| And John, let me get you some information on Machado. | ||
| This is from Fox News with the headline, Marina Carina Machado emerges as top potential successor after Maduro's fall. | ||
| This says, successors to the ousted authoritarian Maduro are likely to be the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner and the opposition leaders, Maria Carina Machado and Edmundo Gonzalez, according to an expert on Caracas. | ||
| This is in Fox News. | ||
| You can read that at foxnews.com if you'd like to read more about that. | ||
| And talk to David next. | ||
| No one. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Oh, good morning. | |
| Hi, David. | ||
| Sorry, David, you're in Pennsylvania. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, ma'am. | |
| Yep, independent line. | ||
| First of all, that call up from Kentucky. | ||
| It's not about race, dude. | ||
| Get over yourself. | ||
| And the Democrats, you got your little communist in New York City hope you're partying because that city's going to burn down. | ||
| But as far as President Trump going out to Venezuela, I lost a nephew two years ago here up in Butler, Pennsylvania, not too far from where the president got shot in the air that he died from fentanyl. | ||
| So to all you Democrats that want to cry about illegal immigrants and all this poor, poor, poor Venezuela, I'm glad that we caught this bastard. | ||
| The President Trump, God bless you. | ||
| Thank you for doing such a great job. | ||
| And God bless my Senator Fetterman. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Bye. | ||
| And we are going to continue to take your calls on the situation in Venezuela. | ||
| We'll talk to Carly Torrance, California. | ||
| Democrat, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| I just wanted to say that I feel as though that most of the comments have been really one-sided of not even about the topic and that we should focus on the top topic at hand of what happened today of Trump using his power unnecessarily yet again. | ||
| And that we it is it isn't about trying to do anything to it's about getting the oil and trying it's like as 9-11 again when somebody said that about being a kid that was raised watching it happen. | ||
| I was in high school and I'm 40 now and I watched that and it was something that was just so devastating for me to sit happen to then watch it happen. | ||
| And now I'm sitting here and I feel as though we're watching history repeat itself as Trump being somebody that we all know and that reflected back in history that was very dictator-ish and took a lot of the ICT movement and all the stuff that's happening. | ||
| I'm trying to use my words wisely so that I don't offend anybody. | ||
| And, you know, I just think that those say that the things that this man has done to people and the actions that he has caused are completely illegal. | ||
| The actions that took place on January 6th, which are illegal, he didn't have to take, actually follow through with his charges. | ||
| The carboning of everybody getting out was ridiculous. | ||
| He's sitting here with the Epstein files and not having to deal with it, and then just goes and blows up Venezuela to make it hidden behind it. | ||
| All right, Carly, and we will continue to take your calls on the strikes against Venezuela overnight, the capturing of Venezuela's President Maduro and his wife. | ||
| They have been both flown out of the country. | ||
| The lines are Democrats, 202-748-8000. | ||
| Republicans, 202-748-8001, and Independents, 202-748-8002. | ||
| Go ahead and continue to call in. | ||
| And if you are on the line, please hold on the line. | ||
| We're going to take a quick break and come back to your calls right away. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We'll be right back. | |
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unidentified
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Watch America's Book Club with Justice Amy Coney Barrett, Sunday at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific, only on C-SPAN. | |
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unidentified
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| Washington Journal continues. | ||
| We are back with you, and we are taking your calls on the situation in Venezuela and getting your reaction to that. | ||
| Our phone lines are Republicans, sorry, Democrats, 202-748-8000, Republicans, 202-748-8001, and Independents 202-748-8002. | ||
| You can also send a text. | ||
| That number is 202-748-8003. | ||
| And we are on Facebook and on Twitter. | ||
| Here's Danny, Jamestown, South Carolina, Republican. | ||
| Hi, Danny. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank Mr. Trump for what he thank Mr. Trump for what he did. | |
| And I noticed all the Democrat callers are complaining. | ||
| And then, C-SPAN, if you could correct everybody, it's not a war and it's not a regime change. | ||
| It was a narco-terrorist drug dealer that had a bounty on his head. | ||
| It's called an arrest. | ||
| An arrest, simple, one word underline. | ||
| And the Democrat callers seem to be more on the side of criminals, drug dealers, and illegal immigrants than they are the American people. | ||
| And I kind of seen that play out during the presidential election with Mr. Trump when it was do anything to keep themselves in power. | ||
| Hide anything to keep themselves in power. | ||
| Cover up anything to keep themselves in power. | ||
| You're not in power no more, Democrats. | ||
| You are losing. | ||
| And it's about time you lose. | ||
| Enough of this baloney that's going on in America with you Democrats. | ||
| You have lost your minds. | ||
| You don't know the difference in a boy and a girl. | ||
| You don't know the difference in a drug dealer and a drug addict. | ||
| Mr. Biden ought to know that because he's dealt with it in his own family. | ||
| And I'll leave it at that. | ||
| Mr. Trump, thank you. | ||
| And Mr. Hag Seth, thank you. | ||
| And the rest of the Republican Party. | ||
| God bless you and God bless America. | ||
| Mary and Prentiss, Mississippi, Democrat, you're on the air, Mary. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, I'm a Democrat and I did vote for Biden. | |
| I will not vote for Trump. | ||
| Trump don't even like black people. | ||
| Trump cheated his way in there. | ||
| You had to be on TikTok and Facebook and things like I do. | ||
| Things come out his mouth. | ||
| The Bible said what's in your heart will come out your mouth. | ||
| So Mary, let's stick with Venezuela. | ||
| What was your reaction to that news? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I think you're just trying to stay in the White House. | |
| It was ridiculous. | ||
| I don't think they drug deals. | ||
| I just think he's trying to distract us from the Epstein file. | ||
| How can y'all be human beings? | ||
| And he's a baby raper. | ||
| This is Dixie in West Virginia, Republican line. | ||
| Good morning, Dixie. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| I would like to say God bless Donald Trump because what he did was great. | ||
| And I'm so proud that he attacked Vincent bringing all that drugs up to the United States. | ||
| We don't need that in America. | ||
| We have enough anyway. | ||
| And he done a great thing, I think. | ||
| God bless him and keep you good up work up, Donald Trump. | ||
| You are fantastic. | ||
| Thank you, ma'am. | ||
| Let's talk to Ryan in Orange, Massachusetts, Independent Line. | ||
| Hi, Ryan. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Surprised to wake up to this wonderful news this morning about Donald Trump bombing Venezuela. | |
| I think he's keeping a campaign promise. | ||
| I'm concerned about how it's going to affect elections in the midterms. | ||
| And I'm also concerned about when Trump was running for president in 2015 in the primary, he lectured Jeb Bush about what are they going to do with the oil in Iraq. | ||
| What are they going to do with the oil in Venezuela? | ||
| Is America going to get a deal from this? | ||
| And if so, obviously, the oil is going to affect China. | ||
| And I believe it's going to affect tariffs. | ||
| And it's going to be a huge negotiating tool for Trump. | ||
| So big win for America. | ||
| Democrats keep whining and drinking the Kool-Aid. | ||
| And Trump won big today. | ||
| Let's talk to Diana in Hamburg, New York, Democrat. | ||
| Good morning, Diana. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| I'm a veteran, and I don't care to excuse why we went in there. | ||
| This is a war crime. | ||
| This is an unsanctioned war. | ||
| Congress did not sanction this. | ||
| And Trump should be held accountable and arrested immediately. | ||
| Here is James in New Hyde Park, New York, Republican line. | ||
| Good morning, James. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hello. | |
| I feel they should free all the drug traffickers and just continue to arrest all the people who sell nickel bags in America and destroy their lives. | ||
| How does that sound crazy? | ||
| James, you still there? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, I'm here. | |
| Okay, so obviously you're being sarcastic, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
So what did you obviously? | |
| How did you respond to the news about Venezuela? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Very good. | |
| Stop the drugs from coming in here and stop him from polluting this country. | ||
| And the oil, the oil is useless. | ||
| It has all sulfur in it. | ||
| What are we going to do with it? | ||
| The Democrats would stop, wouldn't allow it to go in. | ||
| They threw the Democrats removed Exxon out of dealing with Venezuela because Chevron's from California. | ||
| And that's their lollipop. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Here's T-Bone in Wilson, North Carolina, Independent Line. | ||
| You're on the air, T-Bone. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| Yes, please let me make my points. | ||
| I have three quick points to make. | ||
| Number one, he pardoned a big-time drug dealer, head of state, put more drugs over here. | ||
| So he expects me to believe that he's really caring about drugs. | ||
| That's number one. | ||
| Number two, I heard a lot of people calling up saying that they lost people. | ||
| I feel bad for you if you lost people to drugs. | ||
| But it is the demand for drugs in this country. | ||
| We consume over 50% of the world's drugs. | ||
| We are 4% of the population. | ||
| We have a problem over here. | ||
| All these people that are complaining that they lost people, what did you do? | ||
| Did you counsel your son, daughter, or whoever on these drugs? | ||
| We can stop all the drugs from coming in here tomorrow over the water, and they'll still have a drug problem. | ||
| Why? | ||
| Because they will make synthetic drugs. | ||
| It's always going to be, as long as they're demand, they're going to cook up something to feed the people. | ||
| So you got to work with your people. | ||
| This is a sick nation, and we're trying to put our problems on somebody else. | ||
| Number three, the CIA back in, I think it was the 80s during the Reagan administration, they were dealing crack. | ||
| They're the ones that brought the crack into the black neighborhoods for the same reason they brought the crack in here to buy arms to support an illegal war down there in South America. | ||
| That's the reason we got all the problems of the people coming over the border because we have been messing around in these people's business. | ||
| Now you're going to see all kinds of villain swills trying to get here because we go down there and destabilize the people governments in our own backyard. | ||
| This is a shame. | ||
| And we really need to wake up and stop blaming people for our problems over here in America. | ||
| If we got an appetite over here for drugs and love drugs so much, well, people are going to make the money, including our own government. | ||
| They have did it in the past, which make me think, why are they knocking this guy out of the drug business? | ||
| Maybe they want somebody else to have the drug business because it's a lot of money in it and it's not going to be stopped as long as it's money in it, including. | ||
| Am I still on there? | ||
| Yep, yep. | ||
| But we got your point. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Okay, I'm telling you the truth. | |
| Okay. | ||
| Yep. | ||
| So we better wake up at America and start talking to our kids, talking to our friends, and telling them about drugs and telling them how it hurts you because we can stop all the drugs. | ||
| Remember this, America. | ||
| But if you got the demand here, they're going to do something. | ||
| They're going to sniff paint. | ||
| They're going to do something and still die. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Let's talk to Eddie in Illinois. | ||
| Democrat. | ||
| Hi, Eddie. | ||
| You're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, good morning. | |
| I'm listening to all the comments being made. | ||
| And the fact that we're going into another country, destabilizing that country. | ||
| We did that with Gaddafi. | ||
| We did that with the countries, a lot of countries. | ||
| And what happened after we destabilized them? | ||
| The terrorists come in and take over. | ||
| Now, this country that we just took the president out, I think that was just an excuse. | ||
| Talking about drugs. | ||
| I think it was just an excuse. | ||
| Who are we to tell other countries? | ||
| They're not affecting us. | ||
| The drugs was an excuse to go in and destabilize that country. | ||
| That's my comment. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Here's Sam, a Republican, in Fayetteville, North Carolina. | ||
| You're on the air. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, hey, good morning. | |
| First of all, this was not a combat operation. | ||
| It was a law enforcement operation. | ||
| Secondly, I just want to remind the Democrats that Barack Obama assassinated Muomar Gaddafi. | ||
| And at the time, he was Prime Minister of Libya. | ||
| So, you know, stop the hypocrisy. | ||
| You know, we've had enough of it. | ||
| But that's all I have. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| And this is what Newsmax says. | ||
| Headline, Venezuela VP says Maduro's whereabouts are unknown and demands a proof of life. | ||
| Patricia in Circleville, Ohio, Republican, you're on the air, Patricia. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| I just have two comments. | ||
| First of all, your lady who's on there now allowed people to call President Trump of child molester. | ||
| Now some lady called her, called him a baby raper. | ||
| This has to stop her. | ||
| She has to take some control over that. | ||
| It's awful to hear President Malign like that. | ||
| Got your feedback, Patricia. | ||
| Do you have something on Venezuela? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, just that it's a mess. | |
| It's going to be a mess. | ||
| And thank God for President Trump. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| John in Ohio, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
John, Go ahead. | |
| Can you hear me? | ||
| Yes, go right ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I think that people are calling in with a lot of invalid ideas and parroting of the propaganda through the bipartisan corporate-controlled media in this country. | |
| And I've lived a long life. | ||
| And in every military invasion or war that the United States has pushed, the media has been the main culprit in pushing and promoting all of the talking points, all of the lies, propaganda for the loss of life here and abroad. | ||
| At this point, it's really insane that Trump is making what should be a proud country, and it hasn't been for a century, but is using the most mafiosa, murder-incorporated tactics, high piracy on the high seas, stealing people's oil, stealing their tankers, | ||
| and telling other countries that if they don't help us attack Russia, we'll attack them with secondary sanctions. | ||
| The amount of really fascist type of policies that are being perpetrated in this country, I think people don't realize. | ||
| They have to get other sources of information. | ||
| One of them is globalresearch.ca. | ||
| And look up the article, the GLADIO crimes of the U.S. Empire, Glad IO crimes of the U.S. Empire. | ||
| And you'll find in there a good pocket compendium of some horrible crimes, destruction of democracy and freedom around the world, the support of death squad regimes and the overthrow of regimes that are trying to do good for the poor and the people in those countries. | ||
| And we now are now in the same situation where we're attacking a country that Jimmy Carter spoke his electoral monitoring system internationally. | ||
| Said that Venezuela under Hugo Chavez had the most democratic, free, and fair elections that he has ever seen. | ||
| And he was one of the international monitors of international elections. | ||
| Let's talk to another John, this one in Crystal Lake, Illinois, Democrat. | ||
| Good morning, John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, good morning. | |
| Man, that last caller before me really said everything perfectly. | ||
| I mean, at this point, the United States isn't really much more than just a terrorist state. | ||
| It kind of reminds me of the state of Israel, just kind of bombing whoever they please. | ||
| But yeah, I mean, the United States is totally in the wrong here. | ||
| I mean, can some country come and kidnap our president because he's helping commit a genocide in Gaza? | ||
| Like, let's get real here. | ||
| We just want the oil, and that's what it's about, and we're willing to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of lives, just like we did in Iraq, just so we can get some oil and make the rich even richer. | ||
| It's gross. | ||
| Congratulations, America. | ||
| Bye. | ||
| Andrew, a Republican in Detroit, Michigan. | ||
| Andrew, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning, Mimi, former Trump supporter here. | |
| The framing of this discussion is completely off, and some of the callers have a misunderstanding of the facts. | ||
| This isn't about drugs. | ||
| It's about oil. | ||
| According to the DEA, Venezuela traffics zero fentanyl. | ||
| They account for a marginal amount of cocaine, and that's it. | ||
| So what is this really about? | ||
| They want the oil, and they want regime change. | ||
| The drugs are a cover story for Americans foolish enough to believe the same song and dance from the regime every single time. | ||
| And to a certain extent, I understand conquest and resource control. | ||
| That's a story of human history. | ||
| It benefits the American empire, etc. | ||
| I would actually have less of an issue with this if they just came out and said, we're taking the oil. | ||
| But don't tell me it's about drugs. | ||
| It's insulting to my intelligence. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| And this is Politico with an article from yesterday with this headline. | ||
| Maduro says, U.S. invented, quote, invented accusations of Venezuelan drug trafficking amid Trump pressure campaign. | ||
| Caracas is ready to come to the negotiating table, he told state media this week. | ||
| Of course, this is before military action overnight. | ||
| It says that he has rejected President Trump's claims that his government is abetting global narco-trafficking, accusing the White House of inventing a reason to go after the South American country. | ||
| Venezuela is ready to work with American partners to combat the drug trade. | ||
| And with Trump refusing to rule out the prospect of military incursion, Maduro drew connections to the U.S. war in Iraq. | ||
| He said this, quote, and simply, since they cannot accuse me, since they cannot accuse Venezuela of having weapons of mass destruction, since they cannot accuse us of having nuclear rockets, of preparing a nuclear weapon, of having chemical weapons, they invented an accusation that the United States knows is false, as that accusation of weapons of mass destruction, which led them to an eternal war. | ||
| He said those remarks on Wednesday. | ||
| He was captured overnight in a military strike. | ||
| The president has confirmed that. | ||
| President Trump said that there will be a news conference at 11 a.m. Eastern Time from Mar-a-Lago. | ||
| We will be covering that here on C-SPAN. | ||
| So do stay with us. | ||
| We will be taking your calls throughout the program up until that news conference gets started. | ||
| Here's Michael, Stanford, Connecticut, Independent Line. | ||
| Good morning, Michael. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Yeah, I woke up and I turned on C-SPAN and I'm like, really? | ||
| Who's putting these things in his head? | ||
| Donald Trump has enough brains to come up with any of this stuff. | ||
| And like everybody's saying, it's all about the drugs. | ||
| And these guys before were saying, oh, it's about my daughter died from fentanyl. | ||
| It's not coming from Venezuela. | ||
| Those drug boosts are blowing up. | ||
| Who says they're drug boats? | ||
| You don't see anything on them. | ||
| They're not packed with anything but people. | ||
| It's all a lie. | ||
| Everything Donald Trump says is a lie. | ||
| And it's always been and it always will be. | ||
| He says he's not going to start wars. | ||
| What is this? | ||
| I mean, people. | ||
| This guy needs to be impeached. | ||
| He needs to be thrown in jail with everybody that's around him. | ||
| And they don't know that Trump will throw all these people that work with him under the bus because he doesn't care about anybody. | ||
| He just cares about himself and now the oil companies. | ||
| And these oil companies are going to turn around and take all this oil. | ||
| Really? | ||
| People in this country don't believe Trump. | ||
| He's lying to you. | ||
| He always lied, and he's always going to lie. | ||
| He's a horrible, horrible person. | ||
| Even Epstein said he was the most evil person he ever met. | ||
| Here's John in Tampa, Florida, Democrat. | ||
| Hi, John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning, Ceaseman in America. | |
| Happy New Year. | ||
| I always appreciate you guys. | ||
| I'm a Marine, and I don't agree with happening in Venezuela. | ||
| And all the other callers have been calling in a lot of, like the previous callers that woke up to this this morning, as I did. | ||
| I agree. | ||
| This is all about regime change that Marco Rubio promoted. | ||
| It's all about taking the oil. | ||
| As we remember, when Donald Trump was running for president, he told the oil billionaires that he would make sure that they were given whatever they needed as long as they provided him with cash for his candidacy. | ||
| So he's doing exactly what he said. | ||
| I give him credit there. | ||
| He said he would do it. | ||
| He said that he would be a dictator on day one, and that is exactly what happened. | ||
| And really quickly, I'm going to share a true story. | ||
| Remember when we had Noriega, Panama, being taken out? | ||
| Ronald Reagan, when I joined the Marine Corps, was the president. | ||
| He said that the largest drug seizure in U.S. history were two cargo ships, not small boats, two cargo ships being loaded by crane with drugs. | ||
| Those two ships they captured. | ||
| The third ship they allowed to go through to LA. | ||
| I know this because I saw the pictures and I took them to the skiff and I saw the guy reviewing them with the task force. | ||
| So what I'm saying, the reason I started this is because I don't want people to think that I'm a conspiracy theorist. | ||
| I'm telling you my personal experience. | ||
| All right, John, and thanks for sharing that with us. | ||
| Here is Chris in Georgia, Republican line. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'll tell you what, the GDS is just crazy on this show. | |
| We got China. | ||
| We got Cuba. | ||
| We got Russia in Venezuela right now building structures to go against us. | ||
| Drugs were diffused, but those guys are the trouble. | ||
| We have got to keep those guys out of South America. | ||
| Those boats with four huge engines on it flying across the Atlantic. | ||
| Yeah, there's that people on them. | ||
| What is that guy drinking? | ||
| President Trump's doing the best for America. | ||
| People, if we stood united, can you imagine how strong we would be? | ||
| You've got to get off this drunk derangement, Cindo. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| All right, Chris. | ||
| And the State Department has this. | ||
| This was posted in August, so August 7th of last year. | ||
| Reward offer increases of up to $50 million for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of Nicholas Maduro. | ||
| It's not clear if somebody gave information, if that $50 million will be paid out, but that was on the website from August of last year. | ||
| Here is Keisha in Sliddell, Louisiana, Independent Line. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, good morning. | |
| I'm calling because 47 said that there would be no wars. | ||
| How does this help us with food insecurity, housing crisis, homelessness, and unemployment? | ||
| This is an illegal war that Congress has not approved. | ||
| I agree with the earlier callers. | ||
| This is all about the oil. | ||
| It is not about drugs. | ||
| It's about the oil. | ||
| They're killing innocent people. | ||
| And I'm asking, where is Congress? | ||
| We have three co-equal branches of government, and this is illegal. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Chris in New York, New York, Democrat, you're on the air. | ||
| Chris, are you there? | ||
| Yep. | ||
| Yeah. | ||
| Sorry, I didn't get the name. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| I just, my feeling on this is we may need to step back and look at this, what's going on in a broader context. | ||
| I don't think it's really about Venezuela or Maduro. | ||
| I think there is an attack without notification to Congress, any kind of a heads up or let alone approval by Congress to take an action like this. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I think this is an attack on American democracy, basically. | |
| And that's the way I'm seeing it. | ||
| I'd like to express an opinion. | ||
| I'm sorry. | ||
| Listening to Republican callers, it doesn't seem like an America with a democratic constitution, respect for the rule of law, is really doesn't seem like it's a good fit for them. | ||
| And I'm really sorry to hear a lot of the comments that you're coming on the Republican line. | ||
| Anyway, thank you for the time. | ||
| Les in Dodge City, Kansas, Republican line, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| Democrats, what are you smoking? | ||
| It must be something pretty staunchy. | ||
| Do you remember what Joe Biden did? | ||
| He gave away our strategic oil reserves for pennies on the dollar, that oil we were saving for emergencies. | ||
| And Donald Trump, bless his heart, is getting it back. | ||
| God bless him. | ||
| He needs a gold medal, and so does Pete Hag Seth. | ||
| They're doing a wonderful thing. | ||
| I'd love to buy them both a steak dinner. | ||
| I'd love to shake their hands and write their names in the book of life. | ||
| Here's Monique in Hyattville, Maryland, Independent Line. | ||
| Hi, Monique. | ||
|
unidentified
|
How are you doing? | |
| Good morning, everybody. | ||
| Happy New Year. | ||
| Living close to the seat of government, we see a lot of things differently. | ||
| We see things firsthand. | ||
| And what I've noticed is all of these wars that he, these many wars that he's starting all over the place are distractions to keep people from looking at him. | ||
| They don't, he doesn't want to go to jail. | ||
| So he's going to do everything he can. | ||
| He's had 34 indictments before coming into office. | ||
| He's trying to do everything he can do. | ||
| So he's going to bother every country. | ||
| But Monique, he's not going to go to jail, even after he leaves office. | ||
| So he's got immunity. | ||
| All those charges were dropped. | ||
| Right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
That's criminal. | |
| I don't think they were dropped. | ||
| I think they're still out there. | ||
| You think he can still be convicted and imprisoned after he leaves office? | ||
|
unidentified
|
If he has a felony and he has, I mean, we can't. | |
| If we can get nabbed for having felonies, why shouldn't he? | ||
| That's the law. | ||
| So I'm not a legal expert, but I didn't think that that was the case. | ||
| But anyway, back to Venezuela. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, to go into Venezuela, who is minding their own business, handling their own government, and to try to go and take back, they said that there were things that they stole from us, which is their oil, their resources in their country, is ridiculous. | |
| We know it's not drugs. | ||
| Everybody on those boats, there was no drugs. | ||
| When he blew up those votes, there was no drugs coming from Venezuela. | ||
| Those weren't even coming from Venezuela. | ||
| They just keep saying it. | ||
| How do you know there were no drugs on the boat? | ||
|
unidentified
|
They said in the news that there was no, they didn't find any drugs. | |
| On the boats that were destroyed? | ||
|
unidentified
|
There were people on the boats, but there were no drugs recovered. | |
| There were no drugs recovered. | ||
| But wouldn't they have all been incinerated? | ||
| I mean, it doesn't look like anything would have survived. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It would be in the water. | |
| The pH of the water, it would be in the water. | ||
| It would affect the fish. | ||
| If you blow up something in the water, just like with Guam, those fish that were, when we blew up stuff in the water, the fish population died. | ||
| The coral reef died. | ||
| The food is affected, and nothing in the water has been affected. | ||
| That's how you know there's no drugs. | ||
| If there was drugs, it would affect the water. | ||
| It would affect the marine life because it's right there. | ||
| The particles of the boats are sitting in the water. | ||
| They didn't recover any of the particles from the boats. | ||
| Okay, and this is okay. | ||
| Let's look into that actually a little bit more, Monique. | ||
| But thanks for bringing that up. | ||
| Terry in Dixon, Illinois, Democrat. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, good morning and happy new year. | |
| I was going to say this is like Donald Trump's wag the dog moment. | ||
| You know, we've been fighting this drug scourge, and it started like 50 years ago when with Ronald Reagan and the drug-owned war. | ||
| You know, we went down to Columbia and all these other countries trying to stop out these drugs. | ||
| Excuse me. | ||
| But drugs right now are at a record high. | ||
| All we're going to do, we're going down there for the oil. | ||
| They can say whatever they want. | ||
| Today, Martha Rubio is going to be out there and he's going to be shaking this oil vial. | ||
| And he's going to have his colon powell moment. | ||
| And he's taking our country down the dark road because we're going to whack this mole and we're going to take their oil, but we're not going to stop the drug flow. | ||
| You know, if your children are dying, maybe you should talk to your children. | ||
| It's their choice. | ||
| They're the ones that are demanding these drugs. | ||
| I have no one in my family that's died from this because we all make our choices. | ||
| You know, I'm sorry. | ||
| If your kids are dying, maybe you should look at yourself. | ||
| All right, Terry. | ||
| We don't need to. | ||
| And just to respond to Monique, who called about those drug boats that were destroyed, this is PBS from September of 22nd of last year that has this. | ||
| Dominican Republic says it recovered cocaine that was on speedboat destroyed by U.S. military. | ||
| It says authorities in the Dominican Republic said they have confiscated some of the cocaine transported by a speedboat that was destroyed recently by the U.S. Navy. | ||
| It says that they recovered 377 packages of cocaine from the boat that was allegedly carrying 1,000 kilograms of the drug. | ||
| The boat, the officials said the boat was destroyed about 80 nautical miles south of Isla Beata, a small island that belongs to the Dominican Republic. | ||
| Their Navy, in conjunction with U.S. authorities, to locate the speedboat allegedly trying to dock in the Dominican Republic and use the nation as a quote bridge to transport cocaine to the United States. | ||
| If you want to read that, it's again September 22nd on PBS.org. | ||
| It's Dr. Donald in Independence, Ohio, Republican line. | ||
| Good morning, Donald. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, good morning. | |
| This is a veteran from the Vietnam War, and this whole thing is about freedom. | ||
| The people down in South America are being led by dictators. | ||
| And the only way to stop this, along with the drug flow, is to do take out Madura. | ||
| He was illegally out of the election, and he continued to use his military to control the Venezuela people. | ||
| Now, what else can we do but take him out of circulation? | ||
| And folks, I don't care if you're Democrat, Republican, Independent. | ||
| This is all about good versus evil across the country. | ||
| And Russia has just got a punch in the nose because all that oil is not going to go over there so he can use it to kill more innocent people in the Ukraine and all over the world. | ||
| So I'm telling you, folks. | ||
| So Donald is good against evil. | ||
| I'm just curious, since you fought in the Vietnam War, did you feel the same way about that war, that it was about freedom? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Freedom. | |
| And again, down in South America, my good friend served as a paratrooper and a nurse over in Vietnam. | ||
| It was all about the oil. | ||
| I said, how did you get involved with the Vietnam War? | ||
| But he was from Peru, and his other people, other citizens went to fight. | ||
| But you fought in Vietnam, right? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I didn't fight in Vietnam. | |
| I was drafted during the war. | ||
| My brother and three first cousins were already over there. | ||
| Okay, okay. | ||
| I thought you said you were a Vietnam vet. | ||
| You also mentioned Iraq. | ||
| Did you feel that that was a justified war? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Iraq, yes. | |
| But again, you boil it down to a dictator. | ||
| The only thing they understand is firm defense. | ||
| And this, what happened hours ago with Maduro, I think is just a domino, the first domino to fall. | ||
| And then look at Iran. | ||
| Their whole population is up in arms with the Ayatollah. | ||
| They want him out of there. | ||
| It all boils down to freedom. | ||
| Got that point. | ||
| Let's talk to Dee in Morrisville, North Carolina, Independent Line. | ||
| Go ahead, Dee. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, how are you doing? | |
| I'm from, I live in Morrisville, North Carolina, but I grew up in New Jersey, so I'm quite familiar with Trump. | ||
| I voted for him, because what was the choice? | ||
| I'd also like to say my daughter and granddaughter are dual citizens. | ||
| They live in Denmark, but I don't appreciate everything. | ||
| And as far as Venezuela, I bet you most Americans, especially women, could not even find it on a map. | ||
| And I'd even say probably most of them couldn't even put a map together of the United States. | ||
| So Trump knows stuff we don't know. | ||
| He's doing good by us. | ||
| You've got to stop the drugs. | ||
| Yes, there were drugs on the boat. | ||
| That lady said there was no drugs in the boat because the fish didn't die. | ||
| They got blown up. | ||
| We don't know what we don't know. | ||
| He's trying to save us. | ||
| But I am an independent because I'm quite an environmentalist. | ||
| I'm into windmills and all that kind of stuff, nuclear power. | ||
| But people, just shut up and get educated. | ||
| Learn history. | ||
| Go out of the United States. | ||
| Find out what's going on in the rest of the world. | ||
| The rest of the world doesn't hate us. | ||
| Maybe they have, you know, their governments are socialists. | ||
| They're not. | ||
| Those people love us. | ||
| We're the only people saving the world. | ||
| And Donald Trump's doing a good job, even though he is kind of a jerk. | ||
| Here's John Franklin, North Carolina, Democrat. | ||
| Hi, John. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hello. | |
| Don't really have much to say except I think it'd be a good idea if everybody would remember that we're dealing with a criminal. | ||
| We have a criminal running this. | ||
| A criminal surrounded by criminals. | ||
| Who's the criminal you're talking about? | ||
|
unidentified
|
How great this is. | |
| This is a criminal thing that's going to put money in Trump's pocket. | ||
| Regardless, if it's drugs, oil, you know, he don't care where his money comes from. | ||
| You know, he pardoned the guy that imported 40 tons into the country. | ||
| You think this is about drugs? | ||
| It's about putting money in his pocket. | ||
| He's a sick criminal, and nobody wants to remember that. | ||
| And that's about all I got to say. | ||
| Let's talk to Sam in Charlotte, Michigan Republican. | ||
| Hi, Sam. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| Yeah, I'd like to thank that last guy for making a fool of himself. | ||
| I'd like to thank Jerry beforehand for enlightening us on the military strategy. | ||
| I'd like to thank Monique for filling us in on marine biology. | ||
| We're going to let Donald Trump know what he's doing here, and I think he's doing the entirely right thing. | ||
| You could forget about him, the caller before being going on about him wanting the money. | ||
| Don's got enough money, pal. | ||
| He doesn't want to stick his hand in your pocket. | ||
| And he's probably the most honest. | ||
| And oh, I'm going to stop myself there. | ||
| He's not a politician, okay? | ||
| He's a normal person like you and me. | ||
| And we're just as evil. | ||
| Larson lives hard in every man's heart. | ||
| All right? | ||
| So get off the money thing. | ||
| Get off the oil thing. | ||
| This man is trying to save our country from the most evil, vile people in the world. | ||
| He may be evil and vile too, but that's exactly what we need to fight the evil and vile people that he's fighting against. | ||
| Please get behind him, at least here in this. | ||
| We've given him nearly a year here now. | ||
| He passed the inauguration. | ||
| He owns the presidency, and he's going to run it the way he sees fit. | ||
| Either get on board or get out of the way. | ||
| Goodbye. | ||
| Norman in New Hampshire, Independent Line. | ||
| You're on the air, Norman. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| You know, I've been listening to his conversation about things, and I think it's all about power and control. | ||
| And Donald Trump knows, he had said on the news the other day, he wanted his oil. | ||
| I don't know what happened to the three oil tankers, supertankers that he commanded, whether they went to Texas and offloaded the fuel, but he wanted his oil. | ||
| And he knows because I was in Caracas, Venezuela, as a young Marine in 1975 for the escalation of the Faulkner Islands. | ||
| And it's a huge oil port. | ||
| And it's used around the world, but it's been so unstable down there. | ||
| They have interim governments. | ||
| And, you know, if you look back to the Bay of Pigs and, you know, the Russians and the communists that control that area, it's like a lot like Epstein Island or something, you know. | ||
| I mean, you can go down there and buy diamonds, and there's so much trade down there. | ||
| It's unbelievable. | ||
| So he wants to control that area one way or the other and use that to his advantage because it's stopping a lot of countries from getting their fuel. | ||
| And they had a special meeting, I think, the other day, emergency meeting in the United Nations or something, about his actions. | ||
| Now he's stepped into the quagmire down there. | ||
| And, you know, he wants to have an interim government down there that he can deal with and use to propagate his dealings. | ||
| And, you know, I think we're heading into a world of trouble. | ||
| All right, Monday. | ||
| And we are going to continue to take your calls throughout this program on U.S. military action against Venezuela against Venezuela. | ||
| Overnight, President Nicholas Maduro and his wife have been captured by U.S. forces and flown out of the country. | ||
| We are going to continue by talking to John in Congress, New York. | ||
| Democrat, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| I just want to opine for a moment. | ||
| If a foreign country came into the United States and just grabbed Trump and Ivana and walked them away to jail, I think we would not really appreciate that very much. | ||
| Yes, I think Maduro is probably what the kids would say these days, a little bit sus. | ||
| We should look into that. | ||
| But the reason why I live in the United States of America, and I am an American born here, is because we are a country of laws. | ||
| We follow rules, and we are fundamentally, you know, an idea, an idea about democracy and freedom. | ||
| So I don't understand how we, as a nation, get away with invading another state, another sovereign nation, and just taking away their leaders without giving them some form of justice. | ||
| Now, John, this is what some of our callers have said. | ||
| Look, this was an arrest. | ||
| He was under indictment. | ||
| He was indicted on narco-terrorism charges. | ||
| What do you say of that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Where's the proof? | |
| I think that we are innocent, right? | ||
| We're presumed innocent to start with. | ||
| And then we have to demonstrate that. | ||
| And that's why we have courts and we have to go and find out the truth. | ||
| I feel that this is kind of frightening that we can just lob bombs and destroy boats and go on other people's territory. | ||
| We punch down. | ||
| We're punching down. | ||
| I think we're better than that. | ||
| We are a nation of laws, and that's how we have to proceed. | ||
| Here's Bob in Arkansas, Republican line. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, Bob. | |
| You're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, the thing is, nobody's brought it up. | |
| Russia supposedly made a statement that they were considering putting nuclear weapons in Venezuela and Cuba. | ||
| The guy in charge in Venezuela is guarded by Cubans. | ||
| I'm sure he trusts them more than a lot of people in his country. | ||
| Also, the fact that they painted a Russian flag on a tanker so that Trump wouldn't take it. | ||
| As far as the drugs are concerned, that's one thing. | ||
| As far as the old is concerned, the old is probably going to China and other places. | ||
| So the way I feel is that, you know, it's more about getting rid of somebody in the south there that's going to have nuclear weapons against us. | ||
| All right. | ||
| And if keep the calls coming in, we will continue to take your calls about Venezuela throughout the program up until 11 o'clock Eastern when we are expecting a news conference out of Mar-a-Lago. | ||
| And if you're on hold, stay on hold because we're going to just check in with a reporter for a few minutes. | ||
| This is Stephen Newcomb from Axios. | ||
| He's the co-author of the Hill Leaders newsletter. | ||
| Stephen, are you there? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I am, yes. | |
| Good morning to you. | ||
| Thanks for joining us on short notice. | ||
| Want to know what your reaction or what you've heard of reaction from Republicans and Democrats in Congress about these events. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, good morning. | |
| Thanks for having me. | ||
| I think that the reaction from Republicans and Democrats, at least so far, has been one that you could expect or anticipate. | ||
| Republicans, including top Republicans like the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Tom Cotton, have come out today on social media and backed this operation from the president to capture Maduro and Venezuela. | ||
| And Democrats are upset, saying that this is an unnecessary war from a president who promised to not start more wars and end wars across the globe. | ||
| So, you know, I would say just in general, a pretty anticipated response, one that you could expect from both sides, at least so far. | ||
| And any indication that any members of Congress were given a heads up about these actions? | ||
|
unidentified
|
We do know that at least some Republicans were given a heads up beforehand. | |
| For example, Senator Lindsey Graham spoke to Axios colleague Brock Ravid today and told him that he spoke to President Trump on Thursday night about Venezuela. | ||
| So we do know that some Republicans found out beforehand. | ||
| We have not heard yet from any Democratic leaders on the intelligence committee or House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries or Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. | ||
| So once we do, we should have a better understanding of if Democratic leaders were notified before the raid began. | ||
| And Stephen, there had been some proposed legislation about forcing the president to come and get authorization from Congress. | ||
| Whatever happened with all of those proposed legislation and what happened with that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| So there's been a number of times over the last year that these bills have been brought to the floor on the Senate because once you propose this type of legislation, the authorization of military force, it's privileged, so any senator can force a floor vote. | ||
| And we've sort of seen in the lead up to this raid, the campaign of boat strikes off the coast of Venezuela. | ||
| Democrats have repeatedly offered these pieces of legislation each time that there were more boat strikes. | ||
| And every time, save for one or two Senate Republicans, every Republican voted against the legislation with almost all Democrats voting for it, and the legislation failed. | ||
| So, you know, it sort of shows just the length that Republicans are letting the president have in terms of dealing with the military, but also their unwillingness to this point to break with him on global affairs. | ||
| And the House and the Senate are scheduled to come back into session early this week. | ||
| Is there any indication that they will expedite that? | ||
| Will they come in sooner into session? | ||
| Or what are you hearing? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I don't think we will expect them back in Washington earlier than they're expected to be back next week. | |
| But I would say that there's going to be a lot of conversation about Venezuela on the Hill. | ||
| Think you will probably see a number of Democrats offer the type of legislation that we were just talking about, the authorization for the use of military force, making lawmakers sort of have an up and down go on the record on that. | ||
| The interesting thing will obviously be to look at whether Republicans are more critical of the president now that this was a full-fledged boots on ground military operation in Venezuela. | ||
| All right. | ||
| That is Stephen Newcomb Axios, co-author of Hill Leaders Newsletter. | ||
| Thanks so much for joining us today. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| And now joining us by Zoom is Elise Labbitt. | ||
| She is the Substack founder and global affairs journalist for Cosmopolitics. | ||
| She is also a professor at the American University School of International Service. | ||
| Elise, thank you for joining us. | ||
| Good to be with you. | ||
| And our guests will be taking your calls. | ||
| So please do stay on the line with us. | ||
| If you've already called in, if you'd like to talk to our guest, Elise Labbitt, if you could just remind us about your substack called Cosmopolitics and your background in international affairs. | ||
| Well, Cosmopolitics is, as you said, a substack, which has written pieces and a podcast. | ||
| And it's really the intersection of politics and global affairs and geopolitics and the foreign policy and the people that are involved in it. | ||
| So it's mostly about international affairs, but also how domestic politics and the politics of various countries come into play. | ||
| And I am the former CNN global affairs correspondent. | ||
| I covered this State Department for about 20 years for CNN. | ||
| I covered seven secretaries of state and five administrations. | ||
| And so I have a long history on global affairs. | ||
| So thinking about this raid that happened overnight in Venezuela, what questions remain for you as far as how that played out and the future of Venezuela and President Maduro? | ||
| Well, in terms of how it played out, I mean, I think we'll hear more at 11 o'clock when the president talks. | ||
| Obviously, we know it was by the Delta Force, which was involved in the raid on Abu Bakr Balkhati Baghdadi, the head of ISIS. | ||
| So obviously very powerful and talented, skillful members of the military. | ||
| I'm a little bit curious as to how they got into Venezuela undetected, how they knew where Maduro and his wife were. | ||
| It could have been signals intelligence, but it could have also been members of the regime who are secretly against Maduro and let the U.S. know. | ||
| So I'll be interested to know how the U.S. got that intelligence and how they got in those helicopters flew in undetected. | ||
| I think there are so many questions, Mimi, about what happens now, the transition. | ||
| We've been talking about how Darcy Rodriguez, the vice president, according to the Constitution, would become president now that he's out. | ||
| But what happens with there are a couple of others, Rodriguez doesn't really have a lot of ties to the military, and the role of the military is going to be very important. | ||
| So looking at Interior Minister Cabello and Defense Minister Padmo, both Badimo, both have wielded significant influence with the military, which could remain loyal to them. | ||
| And the role of armed forces are going to be key into who takes the reins. | ||
| Cabello is one of the most feared and influential figures in the regime. | ||
| He has sweeping control over the party machinery and propaganda. | ||
| So his power is very important. | ||
| Vice President Rodriguez holds greater civilian and economic power. | ||
| And then there's the opposition. | ||
| As you know, Mikado was exiled and wasn't even allowed to run for president. | ||
| And then Gonzalez came in and he technically would be the president. | ||
| So how is the opposition, do they have enough influence in the country to take over? | ||
| And what is the role of the United States going forward? | ||
| Is the military going to, is the regime going to try and hold on to power? | ||
| Is the United States going to go after other members of the regime? | ||
| If someone like Vice President Rodriguez or one of the interior defense ministers come in, the things that are important to the United States in terms of narco-terrorism is really not going to change that much. | ||
| And so how is the United States going to help kind of midwife, if you will, a transition? | ||
| And, you know, the question is, is this a one and done? | ||
| Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that he doesn't anticipate any more military action. | ||
| But if the regime refuses to go and they start cracking down on protesters, what's going to happen? | ||
| You saw President Trump the other day say that he was, quote, locked and loaded to go after the Iranian regime if they kill protesters. | ||
| What happens if the Venezuelan regime goes after people celebrating in the streets? | ||
| There's a law in the books, my understanding, is anybody celebrating anything happening to Maduro would be arrested. | ||
| So I'm going to, I think it could be very messy in Venezuela over the next few days and over the next few months. | ||
| And Elise, what do we know about how the U.S. has justified this attack? | ||
| And if you could put it in historical context for us with actions against Noriega in Panama and also against Gaddafi in Libya. | ||
| Okay, well, you know, the most similar thing, obviously, would be how the U.S. went after Noriega. | ||
| But, you know, that's the closest comparison. | ||
| They captured Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega with special forces. | ||
| You know, I think it was pretty close to this period of time in the year in 1990. | ||
| Now, both Maduro and Noriega had, you know, claimed victory in disputed elections. | ||
| Both had been accused by the United States of U.S. involvement in drug trafficking, and both had been kind of preceded by this big military buildup. | ||
| But Noriega's capture followed a very kind of short and decisive war between Nicaragua and the United Panama and the United States, in which Panamanian forces were quickly overwhelmed. | ||
| And so eventually Noriega was kind of persuaded to leave. | ||
| It's an interesting tale. | ||
| He was holed up in the Vatican embassy, and there was constant playing of rock band music in the Vatican for like 11 days, the clash, Van Hale and U2. | ||
| And he was, you know, he eventually said, okay, I've had enough. | ||
| And he was taken back to the United States where he faced charges for drug offenses. | ||
| The United States did indict Maduro in 2020 during Trump's first term on narco-trafficking, intent to distribute drugs to the United States. | ||
| You saw U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi this morning say that Maduro and his wife had been indicted in the southern district of New York. | ||
| That's a federal district charged with narco-terrorism conspiracy. | ||
| I'm looking at the charges right here. | ||
| Cocaine importation, conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices to possess, you know, to cause harm against the United States. | ||
| So this is being framed as a law enforcement operation. | ||
| You know, that's what the whole rationale for these military strikes against Maduro originally were about, or against Venezuelan boats, I might say, were originally about, you know, stopping narco-trafficking. | ||
| You know, the U.S. kept saying that Maduro had to go, but that it wasn't involved in regime change. | ||
| I think it's still going to argue this wasn't about regime change. | ||
| This is about getting Maduro out so that he could face charges in the United States. | ||
| What's different with Gaddafi is that the U.S. authorized military action against, and that's really the administration. | ||
| There wasn't really a congressional authorization of war to protect Libyan civilians. | ||
| And, you know, obviously there were many human rights violations against the Libyan people. | ||
| There was no such kind of claims right now. | ||
| Obviously, there's been a lot of criticism of Maduro and what he's done to his country and the crap done at his people. | ||
| But I don't think there's been any real kind of justification using the human rights violations. | ||
| All right, Elise, let's talk to callers. | ||
| Lance is in Portage, Indiana, Independent Line. | ||
| Lance, you're on with Elise Labbitt. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, happy new year. | |
| I'm just wondering, everybody here is like saying about it's all about drugs, and they go in and get Maduro. | ||
| And what about a month ago when he let Honduras Hernandez, the president there, when he let him out of prison? | ||
| Everybody's forgetting about that for the same charges. | ||
| All right, Elise. | ||
| Yeah, I mean, it's a great question. | ||
| And I was on with you all about a month ago. | ||
| We were talking about the same thing. | ||
| You know, the president was claiming about drugs, but he was more of a political ally of President Trump. | ||
| And so it was really a char, you know, criticism of hypocrisy. | ||
| And I think those are going to be a lot of questions going forward. | ||
| If the United States is very concerned, and look, President Trump has always been concerned about drugs. | ||
| And it is true that President Maduro has overseen, I don't know if he's necessarily the leader of this cartel, which the U.S. is tying him to, the Cartel de la Solas. | ||
| But he is kind of in bed with the narco-terrorists. | ||
| But there are just as most of the drugs that are coming to the United States are from Mexico, from Colombia. | ||
| Most of the Venezuelan drugs are going to West Africa and then on to Europe. | ||
| And to be sure, that's funding a lot. | ||
| When we talk about narco-terrorism, that's funding a lot of terrorism in Europe, you know, with a lot of these terrorist groups. | ||
| But it is a great question about, you know, if the United States is really concerned about drugs reaching the United States, Hernandez had even said that he was going to push the cocaine up the nose of those white gringos. | ||
| He was really much responsible for sending a lot of drugs to the United States. | ||
| So it's a great point. | ||
| And you did mention Mexico. | ||
| Just want to show a tweet posting on X from Jennifer Jacobs. | ||
| She's a reporter with CBS News. | ||
| Apparently, President Trump has called into Fox News. | ||
| He says, Trump says, quote, something's going to have to be done with Mexico. | ||
| He says the cartels are running Mexico, not Claudia Scheinbaum. | ||
| Quote, I've asked her numerous times, would you like us to take out the cartels? | ||
| That is what President Trump just said on Fox News. | ||
| What your reaction to that, Elise? | ||
| I mean, listen, all of that is true. | ||
| You know, there are a lot of drugs coming from Mexico. | ||
| The Mexican government over various administrations has been unable to stem both the drugs themselves and the precursors that are coming from China to Mexico into the United States. | ||
| So clearly, Mexico, Colombia, you know, we could talk a little bit about Colombia and the, you know, cooperation with the United States over the last several decades. | ||
| You know, I think it's very concerning. | ||
| If, you know, we have to look at what President Trump says and what he does. | ||
| And, you know, is Mexico next? | ||
| I think that would be very concerning. | ||
| But it does have to be looked at in the context of the recent national security strategy that says the U.S. is going to kind of reassert dominance in the Western Hemisphere. | ||
| You know, the U.S. has kind of, to be fair, neglected the Western Hemisphere over the last decades because of what's been going on in the Middle East for so many years. | ||
| There's always been talk about a pivot to Asia, but the U.S. hasn't really paid much attention to the Western Hemisphere. | ||
| President Trump is doing that and is talking about not letting crime and drugs and terrorism destabilize the region. | ||
| So I think we have to watch this very closely to see if this is just rhetoric or is the U.S. going to step up action along the border or is Mexico next? | ||
| I think that, you know, Venezuela is one thing and it's very concerning. | ||
| But if the U.S. were to do anything in Mexico, that would be, you know, take it to a much higher level. | ||
| Here's Harry in Duluth, Georgia, line for Democrats. | ||
| Good morning, Harry. | ||
| You're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning. | |
| Happy New Year. | ||
| Happy New Year. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| I'm a Democrat that voted for Trump three times. | ||
| Now, what I'm asking, number one, would be for the news media not to use the word allegedly any longer while speaking of the drug boats because three of our ships, I can't name them, I read it, but there were three ships of the United States that were picking up those drugs. | ||
| They come back and said it was worth so many millions of dollars worth of drugs that they have found in the waters and picked up. | ||
| So the allegedly is no longer appropriate. | ||
| Now, where our flotilla is there is very good because not only were these boats deadheading straight to the United States in some cases, but I believe they were hopscotching through the Caribbean and using the islands to redistribute and move forward and into the United States by hopscotching through the Caribbean islands. | ||
| Now, The other thing that I can't understand is that not only those drugs are coming in and pushing through the United States, they're also pushing up here through Canada. | ||
| And for the life of me, I don't know why Canada wouldn't even join in into this blockade because they were being hit with these same drugs by pushing through the United States and into their country. | ||
| So, Harry, let's go ahead and let Elisa respond to those two points. | ||
| So, I mean, we use the word allegedly, Harry, is because the U.S., you know, as opposed to previous actions of, you know, we used to have like these full briefings where the United States, whether it's the Pentagon or the Coast Guard or whatever, would, you know, explain in great detail what the drugs were, how much they were, you know, where they were bound. | ||
| The administration hasn't given all that much information about those drugs. | ||
| And we're kind of taking it on faith what they say that, you know, there's very little evidence being presented. | ||
| I'm not saying that that's not true, but we say allegedly because we're unable to verify that ourselves. | ||
| Now, a lot of the drugs and some of the, I think, boat strikes that you're talking about were headed for like Trinitad and Chibago or, you know, the area between the United States and Latin America and South America. | ||
| And we don't know exactly where they were going. | ||
| They weren't necessarily bound for the United States. | ||
| We don't know that for sure. | ||
| So that's why we use allegedly. | ||
| Clearly, there are a lot of drugs coming to the United States. | ||
| It's unclear how much are really coming from Venezuela. | ||
| But as I said, it's just like there's not a lot of evidence. | ||
| So we can't say conclusively because the reporting is very thin. | ||
| And more on President Trump has called into Fox and Friends weekend. | ||
| And this is Akayla Gardner on X. Trump tells Fox News that Venezuelan leader Nicholas Maduro, quote, wanted to negotiate at the end and trying hard to make a deal. | ||
| But I said nope. | ||
| That's a reporter from MS Now, and this is Josh Rogan of the Washington Post. | ||
| Trump calls into Fox before his 11 a.m. address to the nation, quote, I watched it literally like watching a television show, the speed, the violence. | ||
| And back to the calls now. | ||
| This is Richard in Pennsylvania, Independent Line. | ||
| Go ahead, Richard. | ||
|
unidentified
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Yes, thank you for taking my call. | |
| Let's go back in history a little bit. | ||
| Back to pre-election, during the campaign. | ||
| Remember when he had big oil go down to Mar-a-Lago and he promised them in the world that they would donate. | ||
| Fast forward to today, there was a report in the New York Times as well as others back in October about how he wanted strictly the oil and the gold that is in Venezuela. | ||
| And let's see how many times the U.S. has gone after a country. | ||
| The only reason they go after a country is because of natural resources. | ||
| Silly as it may seem, back in Vietnam, rubber. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| And how did that work out for us, top on your regimes? | ||
| Look where we're at now with Again. | ||
| And one last thing Elise had mentioned about, you know, how did we get the choppers in there undetected? | ||
| It makes him wonder why he was so buddy-butty with Bolsonaro because he had this planned out since he was his first term. | ||
| He wanted this oil. | ||
| He wanted this. | ||
| And he was so close to Bolsonaro that he could have used Brazil to use as a launching pad to get into Venezuela. | ||
| This is what it's all about. | ||
| It's oil. | ||
| It's big oil. | ||
| He's cow tongue. | ||
| How about getting with NATO and going after Putin? | ||
| He's a coward. | ||
| I'll leave it at that. | ||
| Thanks for the call, Richard. | ||
| It's true that President Trump did, you know, kind of have an issue with Maduro during his first term. | ||
| If you remember, that was that failed election and the U.S. tried to install Juan Guaido, the legitimate winner of that election, as the leader of Venezuela. | ||
| That didn't work out. | ||
| And so I think President Trump was kind of loath to do that again. | ||
| And that's why he supported Ms. Majado, the winner, the head of the opposition, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. | ||
| But I think he's been a little bit careful to talk about her as the elected leader. | ||
| President Trump did, Maduro did want to negotiate with Trump. | ||
| It's a good question as to why he didn't. | ||
| President Trump spoke to Maduro, I think, in November. | ||
| There are probably a little bit more easier or less dramatic ways to get rid of Maduro, but then he wouldn't, I don't think he'd really give himself up to be indicted, to be tried in the United States. | ||
| He would have to go to a friendly country. | ||
| And I think the United States did want to try him. | ||
| Why? | ||
| As a message to send to Mexico, Colombia, if you don't take care of your cartels, we will. | ||
| It's kind of an exercise of U.S. power. | ||
| On the oil, you know, that was one of the rationales for going after Maduro and the regime. | ||
| Was it narco-terrorism? | ||
| Was it oil? | ||
| You know, there are a lot of factors. | ||
| And it's not just President Trump. | ||
| I mean, if you look at Secretary of State Marco Rubia, I don't think you can underestimate his involvement in this. | ||
| He's been working with members of the opposition. | ||
| He's been in touch with them. | ||
| The members of the opposition have been in touch with members of the regime. | ||
| So, I think it's, you know, Marco Rubio definitely was kind of the one leading the strategy, and President Trump was the front man, I think, of it. | ||
| And it's a great point about Brazil. | ||
| You know, Bonzaro is a close ally of the United States. | ||
| We'll hear more at 11 o'clock about, you know, the involvement of Brazil or any other countries friendly to the United States. | ||
| But what I think is interesting, we talked about how the helicopters got in undetected. | ||
| You know, Cuba is one of Venezuela's closest allies. | ||
| And I'm curious how Cuba wasn't able to detect this. | ||
| Cuba is known to have very good intelligence. | ||
| I'm surprised Cuban intelligence didn't detect this. | ||
| And it is possible that years of sanctions and years of neglect by the regime there has hurt the intelligence forces in Cuba. | ||
| I think we also need to keep an eye on Cuba and what happens there. | ||
| All right. | ||
| This is Gene in Illinois on the line for Republicans. | ||
| Gene, you're on with Elise Labbitt. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, the first thing I would like to say wasn't the guy from Honduras that was pardoned by Trump falsely accused? | |
| I think Trump knows all about being falsely accused for the last 10 years, he and his family. | ||
| Okay. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And another thing. | |
| Hold on. | ||
| Hold on. | ||
| Let's get a response to that and then I'll let you continue, Gene, okay? | ||
| Go ahead, Elise. | ||
| Well, you know, He was convicted. | ||
| I think the evidence was pretty conclusive. | ||
| And they did have, you know, I don't know that they had the kind of artificial intelligence, Gene, at the time to have him on tape saying, I'm, you know, I'm responsible for giving the United States all these drugs. | ||
| I want to push those drugs to the gringos, so to speak. | ||
| I mean, I think the evidence was pretty conclusive that Hernandez was involved in drug, you know, in the drug trade. | ||
| Okay, go ahead, Gene, with your other point. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, from hearing you talk, I think you're pretty biased. | |
| I haven't heard too much greatness about Trump, but all I've heard is about Obama being okay with Gaddafi, taking him out. | ||
| You know, there wasn't taking Elise. | ||
| I don't think, you know, I respectfully disagree that I'm biased. | ||
| I give President Trump a lot of credit for a lot of the things he does. | ||
| He's, you know, I was on with your audience a month ago. | ||
| We were talking about the war in Gaza and gave him a lot of credit then. | ||
| You know, I'm not talking about greatness for any president. | ||
| And I certainly didn't speak about greatness for President Obama. | ||
| I was just saying that was a human rights type of thing. | ||
| And this is more of a kind of law enforcement, narco-terrorist kind of thing. | ||
| I do think, as I said a couple of minutes ago, I think President Trump, to his credit, is putting more attention in the stability of the region. | ||
| And I'm looking forward to hearing more about their plans for the transition and for what happens in the region. | ||
| And we will be covering that news conference at 11 a.m. Eastern. | ||
| So be sure to stay with us for that from Mar-a-Lago. | ||
| This is Dee in Victoria, Texas, Democrat. | ||
| Go ahead, Dee. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you for taking my call. | |
| I've lived with the Constitution since I was born and I'm 68. | ||
| And I still think what Trump did was wrong because Congress is the only one who should be making war, has a right to make war, not Trump. | ||
| And if you're biased, so what? | ||
| Go ahead, Elise. | ||
| Well, I mean, Dee, thank you. | ||
| But, you know, I think, you know, what we try to do as journalists, and I appreciate that you do it at C-SPAN in particular, is that, you know, you try to look at the policy itself and you try to kind of leave politics out of it. | ||
| That's why at C-SPAN, they say that you guys are democracy unfiltered because it's really just looking at what's happening and trying to analyze it and not take any political position. | ||
| And because I've covered foreign affairs for a long time, I have a good constitutional memory, institutional memory, as they say. | ||
| In terms of the Congress, I think you're right. | ||
| That's a great issue. | ||
| There's been a lot of talk, and it's not just President Trump, to be fair. | ||
| It was with President Biden and President Obama as well about executive power and what can the executive, and we say executive, we mean the executive branch, the president, the national security apparatus, what are their powers? | ||
| And we've seen the Supreme Court give the executive and the president a lot of presidential power. | ||
| I think you're going to hear over the next couple of weeks, members of Congress on both sides, asking for more consultation with the administration. | ||
| I think, to be fair, Congress has pretty much taken a back seat because President Trump has exercised his presidential power in such a forceful way that sometimes it's a little hard for members of Congress. | ||
| And I think there's going to be a lot of, I think there's a lot of criticism of that by the American public. | ||
| And I think we're going to see a lot of that. | ||
| But in terms of Congress and authorizing war, you know, there's been this authorization of the use of force back from the al-Qaeda days in 9-11. | ||
| And, you know, successive administrations have kind of recycled it as the authorization. | ||
| And if you kind of make a loose association to terrorism or harm to the United States, then, okay, we could just use that justification. | ||
| I think there's going to be a real push in Congress this week to get more congressional authority. | ||
| I think this leading up to the midterms, we're going to see a real kind of assertion by Congress of their advising consent rule. | ||
| Let's talk to Lewis in Pensauken, New Jersey, Independent Line. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, Ms. LaBelle. | |
| I don't think you're biased at all, okay? | ||
| Thanks. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm an independent. | |
| I voted for Trump three times. | ||
| Not happy with what's going on now. | ||
| But one of the reasons I think he went in there to get this guy out is because he was talking to Chinese and the Russians, for one thing. | ||
| And as far as how the helicopters got in there, well, I think Venezuela's neighbors are not happy at all because their gangs have been spreading out throughout South America, not just here, everywhere. | ||
| Chile, Ecuador, Brazil. | ||
| They've been infiltrating their countries. | ||
| Now, as far as declaring war, Trump didn't declare war. | ||
| He went in there and got this guy. | ||
| And that's about it. | ||
| Enjoy your day, lady. | ||
| Go ahead, Elise. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Any comments? | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| I think it's going to be interesting to see if people declare this. | ||
| You know, obviously Venezuela is calling it, you know, an act of war. | ||
| I think when you're, I don't think we're going to see any more military action. | ||
| I think that action that President Trump alluded to the other day about the dock, the kind of CIA strike is the closest we're going to get to land strikes. | ||
| A lot of people have said, you know, going after all these boats and the oil tanker, is that an act of war? | ||
| I'm going to leave that to international law experts and kind of legal advisors to say what that is. | ||
| I think that, you know, there is a big problem with narco-terrorism and drugs in the region. | ||
| You're right. | ||
| And it's not just in Venezuela. | ||
| I think, look at what are we going to see about Colombia? | ||
| You saw that the Colombians put a, you know, are deploying troops to the border, not just because of, you know, they don't want migrants flowing across, which, you know, the United States is also very concerned about. | ||
| What is President Trump concerned about? | ||
| He's concerned about drugs and he's concerned about illegal migrants coming into the United States. | ||
| But the Colombians are also concerned about members of narco-terrorist groups going back and forth between Venezuela and Colombia. | ||
| And I, you know, President Trump had been criticizing the Colombian president. | ||
| There's been a war of words going on with the Colombian president. | ||
| Colombia is a very close security ally of the United States. | ||
| Over the years, there's been a lot of good drug cooperation. | ||
| I think that's dampened in the last few years. | ||
| But again, President Trump's national security strategy, and I encourage the audience to kind of take a look or read summaries. | ||
| It's online. | ||
| It is very interesting about how the United States wants to not just assert dominance, but really establish security through the region and make sure that there's nothing, whether it's migrants, whether it's drugs, whether it's terrorism. | ||
| And again, that's something that many administrations have kind of taken their eye off the ball in the region. | ||
| And so I think there's going to be a lot of activity in the region over the next, you know, during President Trump's term. | ||
| It is also true in this national security strategy kind of mentions it. | ||
| You know, there has been China, Russia, Iran. | ||
| They've made a lot of inroads in that region, and particularly in Venezuela. | ||
| Look at who's criticizing today. | ||
| The Russians, the Chinese are looking very closely. | ||
| Let's see what we hear from Iran. | ||
| Yeah, you know, U.S. enemies were, you know, and they're all, you know, whether Iran is very close to narco-terrorism as well. | ||
| So, you know, let's keep an eye on what those countries say. | ||
| On the Republican line in Fort Mill, South Carolina, Maria, you're on the air. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, good morning. | |
| Happy New Year. | ||
| Waking up and trying to take all this in, to me, it's stunning. | ||
| The logic being used to go in and extract Maduro, bringing him up on narco-terrorism charges, and assuming that there is guilt there, that he is pushing drugs into our country. | ||
| The lack of logic is what's stunning to me. | ||
| That if we're following that line of thinking, there are governors in this country that could, in my opinion, easily be brought up on charges of sponsoring that kind of terrorism when you have drug laws on the books in places, mayors, governors in places like Seattle, Portland, even parts of Pennsylvania and Philadelphia, where drug use is rampant. | ||
| And again, following that line of logic that Americans are being hurt by this, it just kind of falls flat for me that we're going into Venezuela. | ||
| We are toppling a regime. | ||
| And I'm sure we'll learn more at 11, what the plan is, but maybe this isn't, you know, another U.S. regime change. | ||
| But I guess that's what I'm trying to process right now: this, we have problems in this own country. | ||
| We have issues that by this logic, Americans are being hurt and Americans are dying. | ||
| And we're looking outside. | ||
| It seems like another case of world police. | ||
| We talk about the sovereignty of our border, yet we go thousands of miles away, breach a border, topple a government. | ||
| And that's what I'm just trying to. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Well, let's get to your response, okay? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah. | |
| I mean, look, Maria, I think we're all thinking that this morning when they called me up and said, Can you come on, Suzanne, and talk? | ||
| And I was thinking about what happened yesterday. | ||
| And then I looked, saw what happened, and I was like, wait, the United States went into Venezuela and took out Maduro. | ||
| It does kind of defy logic, if you will, in terms of like, I don't think anybody, you know, I don't think anybody really saw that coming. | ||
| And, you know, I think what you're going to see by the administration is, you know, to the charges, this isn't very America first. | ||
| They would say that, you know, if you follow the logic, I'm not saying I, you know, this is the logic I think you're going to see from the administration. | ||
| Maduro is responsible for drugs and cartels that are coming to the United States and are hurting Americans. | ||
| And, you know, also you see this flow of migrants that are, you know, that's obviously very important to President Trump. | ||
| And I think, you know, one of the things, I don't think we're going to hear much talk about this right now, but I think it's definitely something to think about: why are we not doing anything, as you said, about demand in this country? | ||
| You know, why aren't there more drug programs for Americans in this country that we wouldn't need to go to far away if there wasn't such to stop this flow of drugs if there isn't such a demand in the United States? | ||
| So I think that's the logic that the United States and the administration and Maduro, this is not, you know, a new thing. | ||
| This is, and I think they're going to say this is not regime change. | ||
| This is getting the head of a regime. | ||
| I'll be interested to see if the administration wants to get rid of more people in the regime, whether it's the vice president, as we talked about, of the defense or the interior minister, because they're also part of this Chavismo, which is the original head, Maduro's predecessor, Hugo Chavez, and this whole kind of narco-terrorist dictator head of state. | ||
| If those members of the regime stay in power, you're really not going to see anything different in terms of flow to the United States. | ||
| So when we hear from the administration about what they're, you know, in diplomacy and covering foreign affairs, we talk about what's the strategic objective. | ||
| We don't really know what the strategic objective is because every day it's been something different. | ||
| One day it's drugs, one day it's Maduro, one day it's oil. | ||
| We really don't know. | ||
| And so I think what's going to be really important is to see how the U.S. handles Venezuela and the region going forward. | ||
| Is this part of a bigger strategy? | ||
| And certainly Secretary of State Rubio has had his eye on this region from when I was covering him when I was at CNN, you know, in early 2000 and, you know, beyond when I was at CNN. | ||
| And then Marco Rubio was a senator. | ||
| He was really talking about Chavez and Maduro and Cuba. | ||
| And so what is the U.S. strategy for Venezuela, for the transition, for that, you know, kind of Andes region, so to speak? | ||
| And how is that going to affect Americans? | ||
| And then the demand issue, as you said. | ||
| And we'll be watching all of that. | ||
| Elise Labbitt is a global affairs journalist and a cosmopolitics substack founder. | ||
| She's also a professor at the American University School of International Service. | ||
| Thanks so much, Elise, for joining us today. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Happy New Year. | ||
| Happy New Year to you. | ||
| And we are extending our program today until the news conference set to start at 11 a.m. Eastern Time out of Mar-a-Lago. | ||
| We are taking your calls throughout this time period up until then on Venezuela, the U.S. attacks that happened. | ||
| We're going to continue to take your calls, but we'll take a quick break first. |