Trump Claims US Will 'Run Venezuela' After Maduro Capture

The US will be 'running Venezuela', announced a jubilant Trump in his address to the nation, without offering any legal explanation or explaining how such an arrangement would even work in our current global culture and society with set international laws and rules.

US President Donald Trump announced that the US will 'run' Venezuela in the immediate aftermath of President Maduro's capture, with an eventual goal of transition to a Venezuelan government. This follows the US military's unprecedented 'attack' (as some call it) or operation conducted in the capital of Venezuela overnight and the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife.

Trump said that the US is going to run Venezuela "until such a time that we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition".

While the President did not offer a timeline as to when he anticipated the "transfer" to take place, he claimed, “We don’t want to be involved with having someone else get in, and we have the same situation that we had for the last long period of years. So we are going to run the country.”

He began his address to the nation by referring to the "extraordinary" military operation conducted in the capital of Venezuela overnight and into this morning at his direction.

He termed the operation as an “assault like people have not seen since World War II” and that no other nation “could achieve what America achieved yesterday.”

“This was one of the most stunning, effective and powerful displays of American military might and competence in American history,” Trump said.

He also emphasised that no American service members were killed and no US military equipment was lost in the "extremely successful operation".

The president brought up the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, formulated by President James Monroe, which was used to justify U.S. military interventions in Latin America.

Trump added his name to it, calling it “The Don-Roe Doctrine” and said, “American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.”

Trump termed Maduro an "illegitimate dictator" who was responsible for bringing "colossal amounts of deadly illicit drugs" into the US, and accused him of overseeing the Cartel de los Soles cartel.

"The dictator and terrorist, Maduro, is finally gone in Venezuela. People are free. They’re free again. It’s been a long time for them, but they’re free," said Trump.

Promising that the people of Venezuela "are not going to suffer anymore" under the US "partnership" with the recently bombed country, Trump claimed that Venezuelans living in the US will be "extremely happy" and that people of Venezuela will be "rich, independent and safe".

Trump adds that Maduro and his wife are on a ship heading to New York, and a decision "will be made soon" between New York and Miami.

A few minutes before his address, the US President took to Truth Social to share a picture of Maduro on board the USS Iwo Jima on the way to the US.

María Corina Machado, the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner and a long-time Venezuelan opposition leader, issued a letter after Nicolás Maduro and his wife were captured in a US operation. Machado, who has spent months in hiding and recently fled the country, said Maduro would face international justice and declared that “the time for freedom has come”. A vocal supporter of Donald Trump’s hardline stance on Venezuela and an outspoken supporter of Israel, she called for democratic restoration and urged recognition of opposition leader Edmundo González Urrutia as Venezuela’s legitimate president.