1.5.26
“Venezuela, Maduro, and Cuba”
From Donna Garner
[COMMENTS FROM DONNA GARNER – With so much in the news about Venezuela, Maduro, and Cuba, I decided to go through leading articles and pull out the important facts to help all of us to grasp the seriousness of this decision by President Trump.
It is not just about oil!
It is about deaths from drug overdoses provided to Americans by the international drug cartel led by Venezuela’s Maduro.
As taken from Chat GPT:
During 2021-2024, there were 400,338 deaths in the United States caused by drug overdoses. That number would be the same as:
the number of people killed in 7 Vietnam Wars;
one deadly plane crash every day for nearly 7 years;
nearly 6 sold-out NFL stadiums; or
the total population of Cleveland.
A CLOSE AT CORRUPT VENEZUELA’S MADURO AND CUBA
1.4.26 – “How Cocaine and Corruption Led to the Indictment of Maduro” – by Alanna Durkin Richer, Larry Neumeister – Associated Press -- Waco Tribune-Herald -- https://wacotrib.com/article_7ffc7694-6eb6-5735-99e8-bf933faa2265.html#tracking-source=home-top-story
NEW YORK — A newly unsealed U.S. Justice Department indictment accuses captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro of running a “corrupt, illegitimate government” fueled by an extensive drug-trafficking operation that flooded the U.S. with thousands of tons of cocaine.
…Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a post on X that Maduro and [his wife Celia] Flores “will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts.”
…Here's a look at the accusations against Maduro and the charges he faces:
DRUGS AND WEAPONS CHARGES
Maduro is charged along with his wife [Celia Flores], his son and three others. Maduro is indicted on four counts: narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.
Maduro is facing the same charges as in an earlier indictment brought against him in Manhattan federal court in 2020, during the first Trump presidency.
The new indictment unsealed Saturday [1.3.26], which adds charges against [Celia] Flores [Maduro’s wife], was filed under seal in the Southern District of New York just before Christmas.
US: MADURO ALLOWED ‘COCAINE-FUELED CORRUPTION TO FLOURISH’
The indictment accuses Maduro of partnering with “some of the most violent and prolific drug traffickers and narco-terrorists in the world” to allow for the shipment of thousands of tons of cocaine into the U.S. [Much of it produced in Colombia but exported by Venezuela]
Authorities allege powerful and violent drug-trafficking organizations, such as the Sinaloa Cartel and Tren de Aragua gang, worked directly with the Venezuelan government and then sent profits to high-ranking officials who helped and protected them in exchange…
Maduro allowed “cocaine-fueled corruption to flourish for his own benefit, for the benefit of members of his ruling regime, and for the benefit of his family members,” the indictment alleges.
U.S. authorities allege that Maduro and his family “provided law enforcement cover and logistical support” to cartels moving drugs throughout the region, resulting in as much as 250 tons of cocaine trafficked through Venezuela annually by 2020, according to the indictment.
Drugs were moved on go-fast vessels, fishing boats, and container ships or on planes from clandestine airstrips, the indictment says.
“This cycle of narcotics-based corruption lines the pockets of Venezuelan officials and their families while also benefiting violent narco-terrorists who operate with impunity on Venezuelan soil and who help produce, protect, and transport tons of cocaine to the United States,” the indictment says.
Successive U.S. administrations warned about Venezuela’s role as a transit point for cocaine and a haven for criminal gangs, terrorist groups, and drug-smuggling leftist rebels from neighboring Colombia.
While reliable data is hard to ascertain, the vast majority of cocaine departs South America from Colombia and Ecuador, making its way northward through the eastern Pacific Ocean, not the Caribbean.
ALLEGATIONS OF BRIBES, BEATINGS, MURDERS
The U.S. accuses Maduro and his wife of ordering kidnappings, beatings, and murders “against those who owed them drug money or otherwise undermined their drug trafficking operation.”
…Maduro’s wife is also accused of accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in 2007 to arrange a meeting between “a large-scale drug trafficker” and the director of Venezuela’s National Anti-Drug Office.
In a corrupt deal, the drug trafficker then agreed to pay a monthly bribe to the director of the anti-drug office as well as about $100,000 for each cocaine-carrying flight “to ensure the flight’s safe passage.”
Some of that money then went to Maduro’s wife, the indictment says.
Nephews of Maduro's wife were heard during recorded meetings with confidential U.S. government sources in 2015 agreeing to send “multi-hundred-kilogram cocaine shipments” from Maduro's “presidential hangar” at a Venezuelan airport.
The nephews during the recorded meetings explained “that they were at ‘war’ with the United States,” the indictment alleges.
They [nephews] were both sentenced in 2017 to 18 years in prison for conspiring to send tons of cocaine into the U.S. before being released in 2022 as part of a prisoner swap in exchange for seven imprisoned Americans.
MADURO’S CAPTURE WAS ‘LAW ENFORCEMENT FUNCTION’
During a news conference, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, cast the military raid that captured Maduro and his wife as an action carried out on behalf of the Department of Justice.
Caine said the operation was made “at the request of the Justice Department.”
Rubio, as he responded to a question about whether Congress was notified, said the U.S. raid to get the couple was “basically a law enforcement function," adding that it was an instance in which the “Department of War supported the Department of Justice."
He called Maduro “a fugitive of American justice with a $50 million reward” over his head.
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HOW CUBA IS INVOLVED WITH VENEZUELA’S MADURO
1.5.26 -- “Maduro’s Capture Is ‘Beginning of the End’ for Cuba’s Regime, House Intelligence Chair Says” – by Leo Briceno – Fox News -- https://www.foxnews.com/politics/maduros-capture-beginning-end-cubas-regime-house-intelligence-chair-says
U.S. Rep. Rick Crawford (chair of the House Intelligence Committee) stated that the capture of Venezuelan Pres. Nicolás Maduro is the “beginning of the end” for Cuba.
Crawford explained that Cuba (Communist president is Miguel Díaz-Canel) and Venezuela (run by Pres. Nicolás Maduro) have had a symbiotic relationship for a long, long time.
Cuba got oil from Maduro; in return Venezuela got medical assistance and military protections from Cuba.
Since Feb. 1962 when Pres. John F. Kennedy was in charge, the U. S. has had an embargo against Cuba.
However, many people who live in South Florida are closely connected with families in Cuba; and the remittances they receive boosts the Cuban economy.
Rep. Crawford stated that he believes those close connections can result in causing people who still live in Cuba to rise up and overcome the Communist regime.
Rep. Crawford also stated:
"This also plays into what I call the communist triad of the Western hemisphere, that is Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua.
This probably doesn't bode well for Nicaragua if we're being honest about it. I mean, I'm sure they're watching anxiously, wondering when the next boot is gonna fall and where they'll be in relation to that…Iran, Russia, China are also “playing in the wrong sandbox.”
CUBA’S FATE
1.4.26 – “Trump Says Cuba Is ‘Ready to Fall’ After Capture of Venezuela’s Maduro” -- By Bradford Betz – Fox News -- https://www.foxnews.com/world/trump-says-cuba-ready-fall-after-capture-venezuelas-maduro
President Trump said Cuba’s fate is now directly tied to Maduro’s ouster and the collapse of Venezuela’s ability to bankroll allies in the region. "I think it’s [Cuba] just going to fall. I don’t think we need any action. Looks like it’s going down. It’s going down for the count."
U.S. officials say Cuban security forces played a central role in keeping Maduro in power. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Cuban operatives effectively ran Venezuela’s internal intelligence and security operations – including personally guarding Maduro and monitoring loyalty inside his government.
"It was Cubans that guarded Maduro," Rubio said. "He was not guarded by Venezuelan bodyguards. He had Cuban bodyguards."
Cuba’s government acknowledged Sunday that 32 Cuban military and police officers were killed during the American operation in Venezuela…
President Trump confirmed Cuban casualties.
"A lot of Cubans were killed yesterday," he said. "There was a lot of death on the other side. No death on our side."
…Trump also took aim at neighboring Colombia, accusing its leadership of fueling drug trafficking into the U.S.
"Colombia is very sick, run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States," Trump said, adding that the country, "is not going to be doing it for a very long time."
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CUBA AND VENEZUELA TIGHTLY LINKED
1.5.26 – “Cuba's Shadow in Venezuela: Havana’s Intelligence and Military Ties Exposed After Maduro raid” -- Efrat Lachter – Fox News -- https://www.foxnews.com/world/cubas-shadow-venezuela-havanas-intelligence-military-ties-exposed-after-maduro-raid
Jorge Jraissati, a Venezuelan political analyst, said Cuba’s intelligence role was critical to the consolidation of power first under Hugo Chávez and later under Maduro...
"Experts usually link Cuba as the most important intelligence provider of Venezuela. This includes issues like running elections, building diplomatic leverage with other countries and keeping the security forces in check, among others."
…A Reuters investigation published in August 2019 found that two confidential agreements signed in 2008 granted Cuba sweeping access to Venezuela’s armed forces and intelligence services.
Under those agreements, Cuban officials were authorized to train Venezuelan troops, restructure intelligence agencies, and help build an internal surveillance system focused on monitoring Venezuela’s own military, according to the report.
The United Nations Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Venezuela…documented patterns of extrajudicial executions, arbitrary detention and torture, and reported that Cuban advisers helped train Venezuelan personnel in methods used to track, interrogate and repress political opponents.
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U.S. TO USE VENEZUELAN OIL BLOCKADE
1.4.26 – “Rubio Says U. S. Won’t Govern Venezuela But Will Press for Changes Through Oil Blockade” -- By Regina Garcia Cano, Matthew Lee, Will Weissert, Eric Tucker – Associated Press -- https://wacotrib.com/article_0d20ef55-2d3e-5961-89f3-07af31314c59.html#tracking-source=home-top-story
WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested Sunday that the United States would not govern Venezuela day-to-day other than enforcing an existing “oil quarantine” on the country…
…the U.S. would continue to enforce an oil quarantine that was already in place on sanctioned tankers before Maduro was removed from power early Saturday…
…Rubio said on CBS’ “Face the Nation”:
…”The blockade on sanctioned oil tankers — some of which have been seized by the U.S. — ‘remains in place, and that’s a tremendous amount of leverage that will continue to be in place until we see changes that not just further the national interest of the United States, which is number one, but also that lead to a better future for the people of Venezuela.”
This is not the Middle East. And our mission here is very different. This is the Western Hemisphere.”
…The dramatic seizure capped an intensive Trump administration pressure campaign on Venezuela’s autocratic leader and months of secret planning, resulting in the most assertive American action to achieve regime change since the 2003 invasion of Iraq….
Maduro is due to make his first appearance Monday [1.5.26] in Manhattan's federal court.
He and other Venezuelan officials were indicted in 2020 on narco-terrorism conspiracy charges, and the Justice Department released a new indictment Saturday of Maduro and his wife that painted his administration as a “corrupt, illegitimate government” fueled by a drug-trafficking operation that flooded the U.S with cocaine. The U.S. government does not recognize Maduro as the country’s leader.
[Delcy Rodríguez was named by Venezuela’s high court as the interim leader.]
…Maduro’s son, lawmaker Nicolás Ernesto Guerra, has not appeared in public since the attack…
Trump told The Atlantic in an interview Sunday that [Delcy] Rodríguez could “pay a very big price” if she doesn’t do what he thinks is right for Venezuela. Speaking to reporters later, Trump said Rodríguez is “cooperating” but reiterated the threat. He said he wanted her to provide “total access,” from major oil operations to basic infrastructure like roads, so all can be rebuilt.