Good morning. We return after a long holiday break and we’re certainly not easing into the new year.
We all woke up Saturday morning to the stunning news that the United States carried out a large-scale military strike against Venezuela. The U.S. ousted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, capturing Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
We learned Saturday from Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that President Donald Trump ordered the attack late Friday. The operation took just under three hours and involved 150 aircraft that dismantled Venezuela’s air defense.
The New York Times’ Aimee Ortiz, Hannah Ziegler and Yan Zhuang reported, “U.S. forces encountered significant resistance, Mr. Trump said. At least 80 people were killed, including military personnel and civilians, according to a senior Venezuelan official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe preliminary reports. No Americans were killed, Mr. Trump said. Two U.S. officials speaking on the condition of anonymity said that about half a dozen soldiers were injured in the operation.”
Few would argue that Maduro being unseated as president is a bad thing. As Axios’ Neal Rothschild wrote, “To the White House, Maduro was a source of problems that extended well beyond Venezuela. Officials saw him as a bad guy who helped to prop up other bad guys in the Western Hemisphere.”
But the question is: Did Trump have the authority for such a maneuver? Should he have sought approval from Congress?
In a news conference Saturday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the operation was a “law enforcement” one, not a military action. During an appearance on Sunday’s “Meet the Press” on NBC, Rubio said, “I mean, we are at war against drug trafficking organizations, not a war against Venezuela.”
Rubio added, “We will seek congressional approval for actions that require congressional approval … and this is not an operation that required congressional approval.”
However, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries appeared after Rubio on “Meet the Press” and told moderator Kristen Welker, “There’s been no evidence that the administration has presented to justify the actions that were taken in terms of there being an imminent threat to the health, the safety, the well-being, the national security of the American people. This was not simply a counternarcotics operation. It was an act of war.”
Holding back
Semafor’s Max Tani and Shelby Talcott reported that The New York Times and The Washington Post both knew of the U.S. plans before Friday’s operation began and held off reporting it to avoid endangering U.S. troops.
Tani and Talcott wrote, “The decisions in the New York and Washington newsrooms to maintain official secrecy is in keeping with longstanding American journalistic traditions — even at a moment of unprecedented mutual hostility between the American president and a legacy media that continues to dominate national security reporting. And it offers a rare glimpse at a thread of contact and even cooperation over some of the highest-stakes American national security issues.”
In talking about the attack during an appearance on ABC’s “This Week,” Rubio seemingly confirmed the Semafor report by telling moderator George Stephanopoulos, “You know, it had to be at the right place at the right time with the right weather, and all things like that. So those are very difficult to notify, but the No. 1 reason is operational security. We would have put people in harm's way, and frankly a number of media outlets had gotten leaks that this was coming and held it for that very reason, and we thank them for doing that, or lives could have been lost.”
The Times and Post reactions
Not long after the news broke on Saturday, the editorial boards of the Times and Post quickly wrote reactions — and they took quite opposing views.
The Post, whose owner, Jeff Bezos, and editorial board have been leaning more conservative in the 18 months, supported the invasion. The editorial board wrote, “Millions of people around the world, most of all in Venezuela, are celebrating the downfall of the dictator Nicolás Maduro. President Donald Trump’s decision to capture him on Saturday was one of the boldest moves a president has made in years, and the operation was an unquestionable tactical success. The next step is ensuring that this triumph sets Venezuela up for stability and prosperity rather than more of the same, or worse.”
The Post’s board celebrated America’s military, intelligence and cyber capabilities as “second to none” and declared the operation as “a major victory for American interests.” The board admitted the uncertainty of what happens next in Venezuela and that clarity is “critical to winning broader support for more involvement going forward.”
It added, “With tough decisions coming and many obstacles ahead, it’s fair to look forward. Yet it’s also fair to celebrate. For years, Maduro was a symbol of the false warmth of Latin American collectivism. Now he should spend the rest of his life in a humane American prison. His downfall is good news.”
However, the Times editorial had this headline: “Trump’s Attack on Venezuela Is Illegal and Unwise.”
While the Times admitted that Maduro was “undemocratic and repressive” and, generally, awful, it also 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. The United States spent 20 years failing to create a stable government in Afghanistan and replaced a dictatorship in Libya with a fractured state. The tragic consequences of the 2003 war in Iraq continue to beset America and the Middle East. Perhaps most relevant, the United States has sporadically destabilized Latin American countries, including Chile, Cuba, Guatemala and Nicaragua, by trying to oust a government through force.”
The Times also reminded us of Trump’s campaign assertion: “I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars.” The Times added, “He is now abandoning this principle, and he is doing so illegally. The Constitution requires Congress to approve any act of war.”
The Times made a strong case for why Trump didn’t seek Congressional approval. It wasn’t because, as Rubio has asserted, that he didn’t need it. Trump likely knew he wouldn’t have gotten it.
The Times wrote, “We suspect Mr. Trump has refused to seek congressional approval for his actions partly because he knows that even some Republicans in Congress are deeply skeptical of the direction in which he is leading this country.”
Calling the president
The attack on Venezuela happened overnight Friday into Saturday. Trump made the announcement with a Truth Social post at 4:21 a.m. Eastern time. Ten minutes after that post, New York Times White House correspondent Tyler Pager called the president.
Trump answered after three rings.
They talked for only 50 seconds, but Trump celebrated the mission’s success, telling Pager, “A lot of good planning and a lot of great, great troops and great people. It was a brilliant operation, actually.”
Trump then deferred all other questions, including whether or not he had sought congressional approval, to the news conference that would be held later that morning.
In an interview with the Times’ Megan DiTrolio, Pager said, “I just called him directly and he picked up. I wasn’t that surprised because the president’s phone habits are pretty well-documented — he regularly picks up calls from reporters. He said, ‘Hello,' and I jumped right in. I told him I was calling from The New York Times and had questions about the operation.”
Pager said it was the first time he ever called Trump’s cell. Pager admitted that Trump really didn’t say much in their brief conversation.
Still, it’s fascinating, and unusual, to be able to reach a president like that, isn’t it?
Pager told DiTrolio, “Mr. Trump has been talking to reporters for decades, dating back to his time as a real estate developer in New York. And we know that he likes to be accessible — not just to reporters, but to lawmakers, staff, friends and foreign leaders. It is certainly a different style than that of his predecessors. As a point of comparison, during my four years covering Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s presidency, I never had an interview with him. And I tried! In fact, while I was working on a book about the 2024 presidential election, I was stonewalled in my efforts to interview Mr. Biden after he left office. I eventually reached him directly on his cellphone, and after a short interview, his aides changed his phone number.”
Calling his ‘friends’
Before his 11 a.m. Eastern nationally televised news conference on Saturday, Trump called into Fox News’ “Fox & Friends” to, as CNN’s Brian Stelter put it, take a “victory lap of sorts.” Trump said, “If you would have seen what happened, I mean, I watched it literally like I was watching a television show. And if you would have seen the speed, the violence … just, it was an amazing thing, an amazing job that these people did.”
Getting an early start
