The U.S. captures Maduro.

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After a New Year’s break, we’re back this week with a full slate of coverage. Obviously, the biggest story from the past five days is the U.S. operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, which we’re covering as our main story today. However, as we typically do after a few days off, we wanted to briefly recap the other major stories that we missed.

On Tuesday, Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Jim O’Neill announced HHS froze hundreds of millions of dollars in child care funding for Minnesota in response to allegations of widespread fraud in childcare centers run by members of the state’s Somali community. The next day, a spokesperson for HHS said that no funds had been frozen, instead reporting that requirements were tightened across the country. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem also said that federal officials were investigating the allegations. 

On Wednesday, President Trump announced he would end the current National Guard deployments to Chicago, Los Angeles and Portland, Oregon; though he suggested he could mobilize the Guard again in the future. The announcement followed a Supreme Court decision to uphold a lower court order blocking the Chicago deployment. Separately, the House Judiciary Committee released the transcript of former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s testimony on his investigations into President Trump earlier in December. Smith said his team had amassed evidence that proved “beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results of the 2020 election and to prevent the lawful transfer of power.”

On Thursday, New Year’s Day, at least 40 people were killed and 115 injured in Switzerland when a fire broke out during New Year’s celebrations at a bar in a ski resort town. Separately, enhanced Affordable Care Act tax subsidies expired, and new restrictions for beneficiaries of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program went into effect in five states. In New York City, Zohran Mamdani (D) was sworn in as mayor, the city’s first of South Asian descent and the youngest since the 19th century.

On Friday, the Justice Department said that federal authorities had stopped a planned New Year’s Eve terror attack by a North Carolina man, who was charged with providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization. In Iran, major protests broke out over rising costs, and human rights groups said at least 16 people have been killed in clashes with security forces. President Trump said that the U.S. is “locked and loaded and ready” to support the protesters if the Iranian government “violently kills” them. 

Quick hits.

1. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz (D) announced he will not run for reelection in 2026, saying he would spend the remainder of his term working to address ongoing fraud cases in the state. Walz has come under scrutiny for his handling of the schemes, which prosecutors say defrauded the state of billions of dollars. (The announcement)
2. President Donald Trump said that U.S. officials have concluded that Ukraine did not target Russian President Vladimir Putin’s residence in a drone attack, contrary to Russian officials’ claims. (The update)
3. French and British forces conducted a joint strike against a suspected weapons-storage facility in Syria used by the Islamic State. (The strike)
4. A group of federal workers filed a class-action complaint against the Trump administration over its new policy to end coverage for gender-transition care in federal health insurance programs. The complaint alleges the policy discriminates on the basis of sex. (The complaint) 
5. North Korea launched multiple ballistic missiles toward the country’s eastern waters hours before South Korean President Lee Jae Myung flew to China to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said the launches did not appear to pose an “immediate threat to U.S. personnel or territory, or to our allies.” (The launches)

Today’s topic.

The U.S. ouster of Venezuela’s president. Early Saturday morning, the United States military conducted air strikes in Venezuela and carried out an operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Shortly thereafter, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, had been indicted in the Southern District of New York and charged with “Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States.” In a press conference later in the day, President Donald Trump said that the United States will assume control of Venezuela “until such time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition.” 

Back up: Maduro served as Venezuela’s president for over a decade, during which the country suffered economic hardship, hyperinflation, and public unrest. In 2024, Maduro claimed victory in Venezuela’s presidential election despite substantial evidence that he had lost to opposition candidate Edmundo González. The United States and many other countries do not recognize Maduro as the democratically elected leader of Venezuela. In 2020, the Southern District of New York charged Maduro with narco-terrorism, and the U.S. government raised the reward for information leading to his arrest and/or conviction to $50 million in August. 

We covered the Venezuelan election here.  

In recent months, the second Trump administration escalated action against the Maduro government, alleging that the Venezuelan leader leads a drug-trafficking network called the Cartel de los Soles that is importing substantial amounts of cocaine into the U.S. President Trump has authorized frequent military strikes in the waters near Venezuela against boats allegedly trafficking drugs, and in December, the Central Intelligence Agency struck a port facility on the coast of Venezuela believed to be used by the Tren de Aragua gang to store and traffic drugs. 

According to Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, President Trump authorized the mission late Friday night, and it was carried out as a joint operation involving more than 150 aircraft launched from 20 different land and sea bases across the Western Hemisphere. Maduro and his wife were captured and extracted without resistance; no U.S. troops were killed, though one helicopter was struck by gunfire, and approximately six soldiers were injured. Venezuelan officials said that at least 80 people, including both military personnel and civilians, were killed in the attack. 

On Saturday, Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, was sworn in as interim president and decried the U.S. operation, calling for Maduro to be returned to Venezuela. However, President Trump told reporters that Rodriguez had indicated her willingness to cooperate with the U.S. 

Also in the press conference, Trump announced a broad plan for the U.S. to “run” Venezuela for an interim period. The president did not specify who would be in charge or for how long, but he added that “we’re not afraid of boots on the ground” and U.S. oil companies will soon move in and “start making money for the country.” On Sunday, Rubio said that the administration would establish a military “quarantine” on the country’s oil exports in lieu of the U.S. directly managing Venezuelan affairs; later in the day, however, Trump reasserted that the U.S. was “in charge.” On Sunday, the president also suggested that the U.S. could take military action against other countries in the Western Hemisphere, such as Cuba, Colombia, and Greenland. 

This week, the Senate will vote on a war powers resolution that would block President Trump from continuing military action against Venezuela. The measure is a privileged resolution, meaning it requires only a simple majority to pass. 

Today, we’ll share responses to the U.S. attack from the right, left, and Venezuelan writers. Then, Executive Editor Isaac Saul gives his take.

What the right is saying.

• The right mostly supports the operation, praising Trump for decisive action to remove Maduro.
• Others say historical precedent justified U.S. action.

The Washington Examiner editorial board called it “a welcome end to the Maduro regime.”

“President Donald Trump took decisive and justified action this morning, launching precision military strikes in Venezuela that enabled special forces to seize and detain dictator Nicolas Maduro,” the board wrote. “Maduro was an illegitimate leader, despised by his own people, who, like Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega nearly 40 years ago, was running a vast drug-trafficking operation that was doing immediate and direct harm to the United States. Like Noriega, Maduro will now be tried in a court of law for his crimes, and the entire Western Hemisphere is now safer with him in custody.”

“The decision to bring Maduro to justice is not an isolated event and should instead be processed in the larger context of the Trump administration’s recently released National Security Strategy which promised a ‘Trump Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine that would ‘protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region,’” the board said. “Removing Maduro dismantles a criminal regime, blocks Chinese expansion, and reasserts U.S. resolve to defend democratic sovereignty close to home. This is what strategic realism looks like.”

In Fox News, Jonathan Turley argued “[the] capture of Maduro didn’t require approval from Congress.”

“Presidents, including Democratic presidents, have launched lethal attacks regularly against individuals. President Barack Obama killed an American citizen under this ‘kill list’ policy. If Obama can vaporize an American citizen without even a criminal charge, Trump can capture a foreign citizen with a pending criminal indictment without prior congressional approval,” Turley wrote. “[Former Panamanian leader Manuel Antonio Noriega] argued that his arrest [in 1989] violated international law under the head-of-state immunity doctrine. The district court rejected Noriega’s head-of-state immunity claim because the United States government never recognized Noriega as Panama’s legitimate ruler — an argument that will be made in the Maduro prosecution.”

“This action not only confronted Venezuela but also Cuba, which was supplying the security around Maduro. Presumably, Cuban security may have been involved in the firefight. While cutting off vital oil to Cuba, the Trump Administration just delivered a blow against the Cuban regime — arguably one of the most stinging defeats since crushing the Cuban forces in Grenada in 1983,” Turley said. “Maduro will replay the arguments from the Noriega case. However, he presents an even weaker case on the merits under the controlling precedent than did Noriega.”

What the left is saying.

• The left opposes the operation, arguing it was illegal and will not advance U.S. interests.
• Others say it continues the United States’s long history of ill-advised imperialism. 

The New York Times editorial board called the attack “illegal and unwise.”

“Few people will feel any sympathy for Mr. Maduro. He is undemocratic and repressive, and has destabilized the Western Hemisphere in recent years. The United Nations recently issued a report detailing more than a decade of killings, torture, sexual violence and arbitrary detention by henchmen against his political opponents. He stole Venezuela’s presidential election in 2024,” the board wrote. “If there is an overriding lesson of American foreign affairs in the past century, however, it is that attempting to oust even the most deplorable regime can make matters worse.”

“Mr. Trump has not yet offered a coherent explanation for his actions in Venezuela. He is pushing our country toward an international crisis without valid reasons. If Mr. Trump wants to argue otherwise, the Constitution spells out what he must do: Go to Congress. Without congressional approval, his actions violate U.S. law,” the board said. “By proceeding without any semblance of international legitimacy, valid legal authority or domestic endorsement, Mr. Trump risks providing justification for authoritarians in China, Russia and elsewhere who want to dominate their own neighbors. More immediately, he threatens to replicate the American hubris that led to the invasion of Iraq in 2003.”

In Common Dreams, Kevin Martin wrote “no one voted for Trump’s attack on Venezuela.”

“Bogus assertions that Venezuela stole US oil raise suspicions this is not about narcotics trafficking, but rather seizing resources such as oil and minerals. Moreover, other countries in the region are surely on high alert that they might be next in President Donald Trump’s crosshairs, and US forces deployed worldwide could be targeted for reprisals,” Martin said. “Trump just announced, ‘…we are going to run the country, until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition.’ No one voted for that, nor has Congress authorized it on behalf of the American people.

“In less than a year in office, Trump has now attacked seven countries — Somalia, Iran, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Nigeria and Venezuela, along with alleged drug boats at sea — with at least 626 airstrikes, according to Military Times. So much for his being a peace president, or focusing on improving economic and social conditions for Americans,” Martin wrote. “The United States’ history of lawless imperialism in the Western Hemisphere and beyond cannot be overstated or discounted, and international condemnation of this episode will presumably be strong and sustained. It is up to Congress and the American public to rein in a lawless executive branch intent on concocting distractions from the Epstein Files, the anniversary of the January 6 insurrection, and the miserably failed policies of the Trump Administration.”

What Venezuelan writers are saying.

• Most Venezuelan writers welcome Maduro’s ouster but say the country’s future is still uncertain. 
• Others say the challenges of rebuilding will be immense.  

The El Nacional editorial board wrote about “the end of Maduro.”

“[It was] a surgical operation completed in just over a couple of hours that laid bare the regime’s inability not only to respond, but to even detect an action against the central figure of the Venezuelan dictatorship,” the board said. “The decisive operation against Maduro is the consequence of the military deployment announced by Trump in mid-August of last year… Yesterday’s outcome is proof that talks with regime leaders for his negotiated departure from power have collapsed.”

“It is hoped that the coming hours and days will clarify the situation facing Venezuelans. It is an unfolding story in which Maduro was removed from the country and by nightfall was in the hands of American justice,” the board wrote. “The aspiration of Venezuelans, who yesterday expressed their jubilation in different parts of the world over the fall of Maduro, is for the recognition of the election results of July 28; the beginning of a process of democratic, social and economic recovery; the freeing of political prisoners and the gradual reinstitutionalization of the country’s public life.”

In The New York Times, Colette Capriles explored “what Venezuelans really want.”

“For Venezuelans, our situation will not be fixed by Mr. Maduro’s departure, let alone by a foreign occupying force. We are not a nation held together by a government or a social contract, but a collection of individuals trapped in a struggle for survival. Replacing the man at the top will not dismantle the web of bosses, private loyalties, corrupt practices and institutional ruins that have replaced public life here,” Capriles said. “Of course Venezuelans want change. We said as much in the 2024 elections, in which tallies gathered by thousands of volunteers showed an overwhelming opposition victory. For many, the demand for change is not ideological, or limited to new leadership. Venezuelans want change in their quality of life.”

“Mr. Trump has not said how the United States will begin to run Venezuela or when it will stop… Whatever is to come, the system that Mr. Maduro has overseen can’t be dismantled overnight. His followers, longstanding Chavistas or armed opportunists, could very well mount a prolonged insurgency — the type of war in which the population is held hostage, regardless of political preferences,” Capriles wrote. “It is very easy to create chaos and make a country ungovernable when the formal institutions are already broken. No matter who is in power, the path to healing the anxiety, distrust and isolation that have flourished over the past decade is not clear.”

My take.

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Executive Editor Isaac Saul: We woke up to a new world this week. It’s still hard to process the whole story, and it has more angles than I can cover in a single newsletter. But I’m going to try to get to everything I can. Here are 14 thoughts on the capture and arrest of Nicolás Maduro:

1. Maduro was an unequivocally repressive dictator. The moment after he “won” Venezuela’s 2024 election offered a chance to force him out of power by leveraging an audit of the actual election results against him, and I hoped a broad international coalition would do just that. They (we) didn’t. I want fewer rulers like him in the world; and based on the widely reported real election results, most Venezuelans don’t want him in power, either. I’ll shed precisely zero tears for his arrest, and I hope a new leader puts forth a new set of values and a new vision for the Venezuelan people. 
2. This should be the final nail in the coffin for any notion of a “Trump doctrine” on foreign policy. There is no Trump doctrine. For nearly 10 years, American pundits have been trying to decipher one — to make sense of “Donald the Dove” who is also a strongman who is also a Nobel Peace Prize candidate who is also a warmonger who is also a non-interventionist. Some see a powerful leader restoring American strength on the global stage. Others see an anti-establishment antithesis to George W. Bush who is done dragging Americans into foreign wars. Part of Trump’s brilliance is this incoherence; it’s that, in part, he is all of these things, which allows American voters to see whatever they want in him. It also really complicates the message for his most sycophantic supporters. It leaves them saying things like, “I’m as reflexively non-interventionist as anyone can possibly be,” and, “I want America to rule over this hemisphere and exert its power for the good of our people,” in the same breath. 
3. Trump’s foreign policy is guided by very few consistent principles, but a premium on personal relationships is one of them. This story provides two examples: 1) Trump just pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández, the former president of Honduras who was tried and convicted in the U.S. for his role in one of the largest drug-trafficking operations in the world. But Trump saw himself in Hernández, who he thinks was unfairly prosecuted, so he set him free. 2) The Washington Post is reporting that Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado would be president right now if she had turned down 2025’s Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump ardently sought. The report was based on two anonymous sources, so I wouldn’t stake my credibility on its legitimacy; but it’s completely plausible given the other examples we have of how personal slights and relationships often drive Trump’s decision making (see also: Zelensky, Putin, Bukele, Netanyahu, bin Salman, etc.)
4. Though Maduro’s overnight capture and extradition was shocking because of the spectacle of it all, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise. I’ve been predicting for months — in our newsletter, on the podcast, on our YouTube channel — that land strikes and a war were coming in Venezuela, and that the only off-ramp was Maduro stepping down (which he did not seem keen to do). I am not happy to be right about those predictions, but they weren’t particularly hard to make — the administration wasn’t being shy. The question now is whether these strikes — this “war” — lasted for two hours and killed 80 people, or if we are in the beginning of a protracted conflict.
5. I’m spending some time this month at my property in West Texas — one of the most remote places in the country, where my neighbors spend more time working their various trades than following the news — yet the capture of Maduro has broken through. Family and friends talk about it over meals; it comes up almost everywhere I go. Since I’m the “news guy,” I inevitably field questions about it when I run into friends. The most common question is “why?” That’s hard to answer. 
6. In the administration’s telling, we took Maduro out because he is a drug kingpin who was killing Americans. But we also took him out because Venezuela “stole” our oil, and now we’re taking it back. But also it’s to keep China (or Russia or Iran) out of the Western Hemisphere. But also, maybe, it’s to put everyone else on notice — to let leaders in Cuba and Colombia (and also China and Iran) know that Trump is just that crazy and they ought to respect it. Or maybe all of this was just to “support democracy,” and our motivations were really the future prospects of the Venezuelan people. Again, here, it’d be nice to know the administration’s reasoning. But deciphering it is impossible. 
7. If I were steelmanning for the administration, I’d argue simply that it’s all of the above. All of this — the fight against drug smuggling, the message to China and Russia, the removal of a repressive dictator, the possibility of democracy, and the upside of controlling the oil — together made such an extreme action worth the risk. That’s an argument I could chew on for a bit, but it’s not the one the administration is offering — and if it is, they aren’t articulating it clearly or consistently.
8. Alternatively, maybe Trump just knew he could pull this off. The domestic politics work with some key demographics (Maduro is properly loathed by many Latinos residing in the United States), and perhaps enough people in Trump’s orbit thought an overt demonstration of American power in the global south justified the military risk. 
9. By all accounts, the military operation was a resounding success (pending more clarity about the accuracy and identities of the reported 80 people killed). In and out. Over quickly. Maduro brought back to the U.S. alive and without any American soldiers killed. For some people, that might be most of what matters; certainly, it reflects extremely well on our military capability. For me, though, the question of “are we capable of removing Maduro?” was never really a question. The question is now what? And this is another question the administration does not seem able to answer. 
10. The account from U.S. officials is of a curiously perfect military operation. Spies fed reliable information to a special operations force that took out power in Caracas and then descended on Maduro’s home, capturing him alive before he could lock himself inside a safe room. The troops’ maneuvers were all aided by rehearsals in a life-size model of Maduro’s fortress. Without being too conspiratorial, I think such a seamless operation invites reasonable questions about whether behind-the-scenes negotiating took place, either with Maduro or the people around him. History suggests that if any back-channeling occurred, we’ll learn more about it in the next six months to 50 years; but for now, we only know what we know, and it looks like a remarkable tactical success. 
11. Tactically, things going well is not proof positive that this move was smart or worth the risk. We found out after the fact that the plans leaked to major newspapers, which didn’t print the story per long-held journalistic practices not to share information that could risk the lives of American soldiers. Even if Maduro or some members of top brass struck a behind-the-scenes deal to cooperate, the operation still carried significant risk — and the fact that the first stage of this operation was successful does not guarantee that we’ve avoided a worst-case scenario in the long run.
12. Trump says we are going to run the country for a bit, whatever that means, and that “we’re not afraid of boots on the ground” (he might want to check with the American people on that one). Vice President Delcy Rodríguez — now sworn in as president — has been recognized by the Venezuelan armed forces, and Trump says she has no choice but to cooperate. Yet her public statements so far are a mix of defiant and pliant, and her background does not suggest she is someone who will roll over for U.S. interests. I’m not at all clear what her next moves are. At the same time, the administration suggests we’re either getting ready to rebuild the country’s oil infrastructure and administer elections (Trump’s definition of “running” the country) or we’ll keep applying pressure on Venezuela with sanctions and pushing it in the “direction” we want (Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s definition of “running” the country). There is a very obvious tension between the administration’s anti-communist rhetoric and its apparent belief it can centrally plan another nation from afar. 
13. If you made me bet all my personal belongings on the administration’s “true” motivations here, cynically, I’d bet the answer is oil. Venezuela is rich with the kind of oil we can refine in the U.S. Iran, Russia, and China were already making inroads (as one Venezuelan celebrating in the streets put it, “What do you think Russia and China wanted… the recipe for arepas?”). Trump has been talking more and more about the need to take back oil refineries he thinks Venezuela stole. This has, for what it’s worth, also been the allegation from Venezuela: That the Trump administration was coming for its natural resources. It’s remarkable, in the most dispiriting way possible, to imagine that in 2026 the United States is still risking wars to protect and pursue its own oil interests. That Trump explicitly campaigned on non-intervention for so long, and now just says it out loud, is salt in the wound. 
14. I have to ask: Who wants this? Genuinely. If any tangible cost accumulates here, I suspect it is going to become a huge problem for Trump politically. Just two months ago, the Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard declared the U.S. strategy of “regime change” over. Democratic lawmakers say that Marco Rubio and Pete Hegseth told them explicitly that they were not pursuing regime change in Venezuela. Whether you think this mission was unconstitutional without congressional approval or legally in bounds with a long-unrestrained executive branch or simply a violation of international law, it certainly feels illegal and immoral. More instability in Venezuela could also mean more Venezuelan migrants, which means more Venezuelan refugees arriving at the U.S. border, this time as a direct result of our own actions. If you pluck an American off the street and ask them about the prospects of kidnapping Venezuela’s president and running the country for a bit, what percentage of people are going to express support? Two percent? Five percent? After running the campaign Trump ran, I have no idea how he sells any of this to the American public. Successful mission or not, I for one have zero desire to see what’s at the end of the road we just got on. 

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Under the radar.

In October, the Trump administration announced a 25% tariff on upholstered furniture, kitchen cabinets, and vanities that were set to increase to between 30% and 50% at the start of 2026. However, on December 31, the White House said the elevated tariffs would be delayed at least one year. According to a White House fact sheet, the pause reflects “productive negotiations with trade partners” on wood imports, though the base 25% tariffs will remain in effect. While the administration says the tariffs are intended to “bolster American industry,” furniture prices have increased since they were implemented, with prices for kitchen and dining room furniture rising 4.6% in November compared to the year prior. ABC News has the story.

Numbers.

• 10:46 PM ET. The time on Friday when President Donald Trump gave the final go-ahead order to commence the operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. 
• 2:01 AM Venezuelan Standard Time (VET). The time on Saturday when U.S. forces reached Maduro’s compound.
• 4:29 AM VET. The time on Saturday when Maduro and his wife were transferred to the U.S.S. Iwo Jima. 
• 23% and 55%. The percentage of Venezuelans who said they supported and opposed, respectively, U.S. military intervention in Venezuela in a December 2025 Datanálisis poll. 
• 64% and 17%. The percentage of Venezuelans living outside the country who said they supported and opposed, respectively, U.S. military action to depose Maduro in an October 2025 AtlasIntel poll. 
• 17% and 45%. The percentage of U.S. adults who said they supported and opposed, respectively, the U.S. using military force to overthrow Maduro in a November 2025 Economist/YouGov poll. 
• 15% and 50%. The percentage of U.S. adults who said they thought the situation was and was not, respectively, a national emergency for the United States. 

The extras.

• One year ago today we were on break and had just published a retrospective of our best stuff from 2024.
• The most clicked link in Tuesday’s newsletter was what Americans in 1998 tried to predict for 2025.
• Nothing to do with politics: A thief in New Jersey returned mandolins with a note apologizing for stealing them while drunk.
• Tuesday’s survey: 2,285 readers responded to our survey on the strikes in Nigeria with 62% saying they aren’t addressing a real problem and won’t produce a real solution. “As in Afghanistan, air strikes are NOT precision or surgical, and will not be a solution to ending Islamic terrorism,” one respondent said. “There is a real problem with violence, but not isolated to Christians,” said another.

Have a nice day.

On the slopes of Italy’s Mount Girifalco, one rural village experienced a 30-year first in March: the birth of a child. The baby, named Lara, has become a symbol of hope for a town that has undergone drastic depopulation in recent years — and for a country with a fertility rate measured at 1.18 in 2024, one of the lowest in the European Union. “People who didn’t even know Pagliara dei Marsi existed have come, only because they had heard about Lara,” the baby’s mother, Cinzia Trabucco, said. “At just nine months old, she’s famous.” The Guardian has the story.