The United States has captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and flew him out of the country in an extraordinary nighttime operation that was accompanied by a flurry of strikes following months of escalating Trump administration pressure on the oil-rich South American nation.
The US is now deciding next steps for Venezuela, President Donald Trump said late on Saturday (AEDT) on Fox News, adding: “We’ll be involved in it very much.”
Ahead of a scheduled press conference, Mr Trump also told the conservative broadcaster he watched Mr Maduro’s capture live.
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“I mean, I watched it, literally, like I was watching a television show. And if you would have seen the speed, the violence,” Mr Trump said in a telephone interview.
“We watched every aspect of it.”
He added that the strike was a “signal we’re not going to be pushed around”.
The legal authority for the attack was not immediately clear. The stunning American military action, which plucked a nation’s sitting leader from office, echoed the US invasion of Panama that led to the surrender and seizure of its leader, Manuel Antonio Noriega, in 1990 — exactly 36 years ago.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was “deeply alarmed” by the strike, a spokesman said, because it could lead to a “dangerous precedent”.
France, Russia and China condemned the incident while the European Union called for restraint and respect for international law.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi said Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, would face charges after an indictment in New York. Ms Bondi vowed in a social media post that the couple would “soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts”.
Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores wave to supporters in front of Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas in January last year. Credit: Federico Parra/AFP
Mr Maduro and other Venezuelan officials were indicted in 2020 on “narco-terrorism” conspiracy charges, but it was not previously known his wife had been and it wasn’t clear if Ms Bondi was referring to a new indictment. Mr Trump said the couple were aboard the US warship Iwo Jima and headed to New York, where they will face prosecution.
Venezuelan ruling party leader Nahum Fernández told The Associated Press that Mr Maduro and Ms Flores were at their home within the Ft. Tiuna military installation when they were captured.
“That’s where they bombed,” he said. “And, there, they carried out what we could call a kidnapping of the president and the first lady of the country.”
Early Saturday (about 5pm AEDT), multiple explosions rang out and low-flying aircraft swept through the Venezuelan capital. Mr Maduro’s government accused the United States of attacking civilian and military installations, calling it an “imperialist attack” and urging citizens to take to the streets.
With the Venezuelan leader’s whereabouts not known, the vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, would take power under Venezuelan law. There was no confirmation that had happened, though she did issue a statement after the strike, demanding proof of life for Maduro and his wife.
Mr Maduro, Mr Trump said, “has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the Country. This operation was done in conjunction with US Law Enforcement”.
US Vice President JD Vance said early Sunday (AEDT) that Venezuela ignored offers to reach a settlement, adding that captured leader Nicolas Maduro was the “newest person to find out that President Trump means what he says”.
“The president offered multiple off ramps, but was very clear throughout this process: the drug trafficking must stop, and the stolen oil must be returned to the United States,” Mr Vance said in a post on X.
Mr Vance also doubled down on the US justification that Maduro was a fugitive from US law, saying: “You don’t get to avoid justice for drug trafficking in the United States because you live in a palace in Caracas.”
The attack itself lasted less than 30 minutes and the explosions — at least seven blasts — sent people rushing into the streets, while others took to social media to report what they’d seen and heard.
Smoke rises from Port of La Guaira after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard on Saturday in Caracas. Credit: Jesus Vargas/Getty Images
Some Venezuelan civilians and members of the military were killed, said Ms Rodríguez, the vice-president, without giving a number. Mr Trump said some U.S. forces were injured in the strikes but that he believed “we had nobody killed.”
It was not known if more actions lie ahead, though Trump said in his post that the strikes were carried out “successfully”.
The White House did not immediately respond to queries on where Mr Maduro and his wife were being flown to.
Maduro last appeared on state television Friday while meeting with a delegation of Chinese officials in Caracas.
The strike followed a months-long Trump administration pressure campaign on the Venezuelan leader, including a major build-up of American forces in the waters off South America and attacks on boats in the eastern Pacific and Caribbean accused of carrying drugs. Last week, the CIA was behind a drone strike at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels — the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil since the U.S. began strikes in September.
As of Friday, US time, the number of known boat strikes was 35 and the number of people killed at least 115, according to the Trump administration. Mr Trump said that the US is engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels and has justified the boat strikes as a necessary to stem the flow of drugs into the U.S.
Mr Maduro has decried the US military operations as a thinly veiled effort to oust him from power.
Some streets in Caracas fill up
Venezuela’s government responded to the attack with a call to action: “People to the streets!”
Armed people and uniformed members of a civilian militia headed into the streets of a Caracas neighbourhood long considered a stronghold of the ruling party.
A highway in central Caracas is empty after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard earlier in the day. Credit: Jesus Vargas/Getty Images
At a pro-Maduro protest in the capital, Caracas Mayor Carmen Meléndez joined a crowd demanding Maduro’s return.
“Maduro, hold on, the people are rising up!” the crowd chanted. They also said: “We are here Nicolás Maduro. If you can hear us, we are here!”
In other parts of the city, the streets remained empty hours after the attack, as residents absorbed events. Some areas remained without power, but vehicles moved freely.
“How do I feel? Scared, like everyone,” said Caracas resident Noris Prada, who sat on an empty avenue looking down at his phone. “Venezuelans woke up scared, many families couldn’t sleep.”
Video obtained from Caracas and an unidentified coastal city showed tracers and smoke clouding the landscape as repeated muted explosions illuminated the night sky. Other footage showed cars passing on a highway as blasts illuminated the hills behind them. The videos were verified by The Associated Press.
Smoke was seen rising from the hangar of a military base in Caracas, while another military installation in the capital was without power.
The Venezuelan government’s statement said Maduro had “ordered all national defence plans to be implemented” and declared a state of emergency that gives him the power to suspend people’s rights and expand the role of the armed forces.
The website of the US Embassy in Venezuela, a post that has been closed since 2019, urged American citizens to shelter in place.
Reaction begins to emerge
The FAA warned all commercial and private US pilots that the airspace over Venezuela and the small island nation of Curacao, just off the coast of the country, was off limits “due to safety-of-flight risks associated with ongoing military activity.”
Members of Cuadrantes De La Paz patrol the surroundings of the Port of La Guaira after the explosions. Credit: Jesus Vargas/Getty Images
The Armed Services committees in both houses of Congress, which have jurisdiction over military matters, have not been notified by the administration of any actions, according to a person familiar with the matter and granted anonymity to discuss it.
Lawmakers from both political parties in Congress have raised deep reservations and flat-out objections to the U.S. attacks on boats suspected of drug smuggling near the Venezuelan coast and Congress has not specifically approved an authorization for the use of military force for such operations in the region.
Connecticut Rep. Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said he had seen no evidence that would justify Trump striking Venezuela without approval from Congress and demanded an immediate briefing by the administration on “its plan to ensure stability in the region and its legal justification for this decision.”
Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau said the military action and seizure of Maduro marks “a new dawn for Venezuela,” saying that “the tyrant is gone.” He posted on X hours after the strike. His boss, Rubio, reposted a post from July that said Maduro “is NOT the President of Venezuela and his regime is NOT the legitimate government.”
Cuba, a supporter of the Maduro government and a longtime adversary of the United States, called for the international community to respond to what President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez called “the criminal attack.”
“Our zone of peace is being brutally assaulted,” he said on X. Iran’s Foreign Ministry also condemned the strikes.
President Javier Milei of Argentina praised the claim by his close ally, Trump, that Maduro had been captured with a political slogan he often deploys to celebrate right-wing advances: “Long live freedom, dammit!”
