The United States attacked Venezuela and captured its long-serving President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday, with U.S. President Donald Trump promising to put the country under American control for now, even as Venezuelan officials vowed defiance.
As part of a dramatic overnight operation that knocked out electricity in parts of Caracas, Venezuelan capital, U.S. Special Forces captured Maduro in or near one of his safe houses, Trump said. With Maduro in U.S. custody, “We will run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition,” Trump said during a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. “We can’t take a chance that someone else takes over Venezuela who doesn’t have the interests of Venezuelans in mind.”
A plane carrying Maduro landed in upstate New York on Saturday evening, multiple news outlets reported.
It is unclear how Trump plans to oversee Venezuela. U.S. forces have no control over the country itself, and Maduro’s government appears not only to still be in charge but to have no appetite for cooperating with Washington.
Maduro, who was indicted on various U.S. charges, including narco-terrorism conspiracy, is expected to make an initial appearance in Manhattan federal court on Monday, according to a Justice Department official.
Maduro’s apparent successor, Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, appeared on Venezuelan television Saturday afternoon with other top officials to decry what she called a kidnapping.
“We demand the immediate release of President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores,” Rodriguez said, calling Maduro “the only president of Venezuela.”
Rodriguez spoke hours after Trump said his administration had been in touch with her and that she appeared cooperative, adding that “She really doesn’t have a choice.”
In Venezuela, the streets were mostly calm on Saturday. Soldiers patrolled some parts and small pro-Maduro crowds gathered in Caracas.
Others expressed relief. “I’m happy, I doubted for a moment that it was happening because it’s like a movie,” said merchant Carolina Pimentel, 37, in the city of Maracay. “It’s all calm now, but I feel like at any moment everyone will be out celebrating.”
At his press conference, where he was accompanied by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Trump did not provide specific answers to repeated questions about how the United States would take over and run Venezuela.
“The people that are standing right behind me” — such as Rubio and Hegseth — would oversee the country, Trump said.
He said he was open to sending U.S. forces into Venezuela. “We’re not afraid of boots on the ground,” he said.
The removal of Maduro, whom critics called a dictator as he led Venezuela with a heavy hand for more than 12 years, could open a power vacuum in the country, which is bordered by Colombia, Brazil, Guyana, and the Caribbean.
Although the U.S. planned to cooperate with in Venezuela was not made clear, Trump publicly closed the door on working with opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, widely seen as Maduro’s most credible opponent.
Trump said the United States has not been in contact with Machado. “She doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country,” he said.
Trump’s comment outraged some supporters of Machado, who has voiced support for U.S. actions to fight alleged drug trafficking and who dedicated her Nobel Prize win to Trump and the Venezuelan people.
Machado “is the most respected politician in the country,” said Pedro Burelli, a former board member at state oil company PDVSA, on X. “Venezuela is broke and needy, but it is not about to surrender to absurd whims.”
Before Saturday, the U.S. had not made such a direct intervention in the region since the invasion of Panama 37 years ago to depose military leader Manuel Noriega over allegations that he led a drug-running operation. The United States has leveled similar charges against Maduro, accusing him of running a “narco-state” and rigging the 2024 election.
Maduro, a 63-year-old former bus driver handpicked by the dying Hugo Chavez to succeed him in 2013, has denied those claims and said Washington was intent on taking control of his nation’s oil reserves, the largest in the world.
