00:04:29.500Which means, essentially, you're going to have Rubio,
00:04:32.600you're going to have Trump working directly with the regime that is currently in place.
00:04:38.540Now, of course, we also heard that Stephen Miller playing a huge role in this as well,
00:04:43.600and a lot of reporting out there that perhaps he may be stepping up.
00:04:46.800And we know that Stephen Miller's main focus has always been immigration and these flows,
00:04:53.300these flows of the migrants from South America, Latin America, up to the United States.
00:04:59.460This has been the key singular focus for the administration since they took power all the way back in January.
00:05:07.200So the question is, does this play a role in the overall flows of migration from South America, Latin America to the United States?
00:05:18.920Is this perhaps going to be part of a move that is intended to shut down those flows?
00:05:26.440And because, look, when you put Stephen Miller in the mix, we know that this is something that Stephen Miller thinks about constantly is his play to take a look at the migration and say, if we move this piece here and this piece here, take this piece off the board.
00:05:42.800Does that stop flows coming up? We shall see. I'm not trying to argue that it's some 40 chess thing.
00:05:48.980I'm just trying to explain what I think the strategy is here. My analysis, you can take it or leave it.
00:05:55.680What do we also have? One of the most stunning operations of one of the most stunning operations of the United States military that we've seen in years.
00:06:09.320Of course, we've got video footage of Maduro now. He was taken up to Guantanamo Bay where I got to spend some time.
00:06:15.880I'll simply say this. When we had detainees at Guantanamo Bay, we did not, when we were moving them through the sally ports, when we were putting them in handcuffs and restraints, we did not, we weren't smiling and laughing and we certainly weren't setting it up like this.
00:06:33.520So a lot of questions about that going through, but a lot of questions going forward as well.
00:06:37.780We also have the email up. Question of the day. 1776 at humanevents.com. 1776 at humanevents.com.
00:06:45.920I know there's a lot of opinions on this. I have a lot of opinions on this. A lot of thoughts.
00:06:49.700Email us. We've already got a bunch coming in. Send us your messages. Send us what you think
00:06:55.440about everything that's happened and everything that you think will come next. We're going to read
00:06:59.640the best ones, the top emails, the top responses here on the show. Human Events daily. Lock in
00:07:06.7602026 has begun is everyone enjoying the fourth turning yet
00:07:11.840in our way in our golden age has just begun this is human events with jack
00:07:25.160now it's time for everyone to understand what america first truly means welcome to the second
00:10:31.820All your thoughts, Trump, Venezuela, Maduro, all the rest of it.
00:10:35.340Want to bring in now, my good friend, we were chatting over the weekend about all of this
00:10:39.580because i was actually trying to unplug a little bit with my family you guys saw we had some social
00:10:45.320media posts we're on a ski trip up to pennsylvania up through the poconos which we love so much and i
00:10:51.900want to bring on now dan caldwell senior fell senior fellow for foreign policy at american
00:10:58.040moment dan how are you i'm doing well thank you for having me on jack you gotta work on getting
00:11:03.420your new title down i was like it's not it's not flowing yeah i'll get it there i'll get it there
00:11:06.840Look, you and I talked a we laid out scenarios for Venezuela, for a potential military operation in Venezuela a couple of weeks ago, right here on the program.
00:11:18.180Now it appears the president has made his choice, as the world can see.
00:11:21.680One option has been chosen, the special operator insertion and extraction of the, well, the highest HVT, high value target in all of the country, President Maduro himself.
00:11:34.560Before we get into all the geopolitics of it, just walk us through, in a basic sense, are there really people out there who thought the United States didn't have the cybersecurity, the cyber warfare capabilities, and the special operations force to be able to do this?
00:11:51.100Yes. And, you know, I do have to be honest about something, is that when you look at the record of Americans' big military interventions over the last few years, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, is that in a broad sense, there's been a lot of strategic failure.
00:12:12.720But at a tactical level, time and time again, our military demonstrated an ability to adapt
00:12:20.760to changing conditions, to learn new tactics and integrate new technology rapidly into their
00:12:27.720operations. And you saw again and again, enormous feats of bravery and tactical success. Look at
00:12:36.200the Bin Laden raid, look at the Captain Phillips rescue. Again, just because we failed at a
00:12:41.700strategic level doesn't mean that we don't have the ability to pull off these spectacular
00:12:46.860operations. And I just have to note from a historical perspective, Jack, I heard you in
00:12:51.780the intro say that this is one of the most spectacular special operations in American
00:12:58.960history. I would say it's one of the most spectacular operations in global history.
00:13:03.680I think it's up there with Israel's Entebbe raid. And even if we find out that there was a lot of
00:13:09.200deals cut, and there are a lot of things that were done to ensure that our special operators
00:13:15.120entered into Caracas and Venezuelan airspace safely, it is still very spectacular. And
00:13:21.200regardless of what people think about the decision, we have to acknowledge that. And again,
00:13:25.960one last thing I'd also point out, too, is that they did this on practically a full moon. So there
00:13:32.780was very high levels of illumination, which made the operation even more risky. And it was still
00:13:39.260100% successful. There were a few casualties. My understanding is, is that those operators
00:13:44.880are going to recover, but it's still one of the most spectacular special forces operations
00:13:49.180in world history. That's exactly right. I believe Entebbe is where Netanyahu lost his brother
00:13:55.800in in that raid and his older brother and they're both in in the forces together and
00:14:03.800no when you look at you look at the history of u.s special forces and you go back to like
00:14:08.580operation eagle claw which really wasn't that long ago in just in terms of history it was 1980
00:14:15.320and this spectacular unfortunate situation that happened with the attempted extraction the freeing
00:14:22.360of the Iranian hostages, and now you fast forward, here we are just a couple decades later and able
00:14:28.140to pull off something that I think to a lot of people seemed like it would be out of a movie.
00:14:33.200Guess what? That's actually what the U.S. can do. And I really want to also point out
00:14:38.100the cyber capabilities that were showcased here because the power structures, the Chinese radars,
00:14:45.560so many of the things that went down, you and I talk about this all the time,
00:14:48.880that that was not done kinetically. A lot of this was done through cyber warfare.
00:14:54.060So really shows the Trump administration's full embrace of cyber capability.
00:14:59.880Right. And I'm sure there's a lot of specifics that you and I don't know about and that we won't
00:15:07.180learn about for years, if not decades. But this was clearly a full spectrum operation that
00:15:13.620integrated all the capabilities of the United States military and the intelligence community
00:15:18.740to pull this off. And again, you can't deny the fact that this is very spectacular.
00:15:26.140And you brought up Operation Eagle Claw and Desert One. That was a disaster for Delta Force.
00:15:34.560That was their first big mission. And even after that, the Delta Force and what eventually morphed
00:15:40.040in the JSOC really struggled. Grenada, for example, there was a lot of failed operations
00:15:47.540leading in Grenada. And it really took over a decade for Delta Force and the broader joint
00:15:55.080special operations organization to really find its groove and to be able to start pulling off
00:16:01.020operations. And it's really amazing how much they've matured and how capable they've become
00:16:06.980over the last four and a half decades.
00:16:09.640Since you mentioned Grenada, by the way,
00:21:40.160And that created a lot of chaos in the country.
00:21:42.880We could try and attempt something similar in Venezuela. And yes, Venezuela and Iraq and Afghanistan and Libya are different, but there's a high risk you'd have the same result. You'd have a civil war regime collapse, and that would undermine what the president is trying to do.
00:22:00.340It would make it harder to send illegal immigrants back to Venezuela.
00:22:03.380It'd be harder to rehabilitate the Venezuelan oil industry.
00:22:06.920It'd likely have spillover effects in the broader region.
00:22:10.200It could lead to more Venezuelans trying to illegally immigrate to the United States.
00:22:14.240So right now, the best option for it is to maintain a semblance of stability by working with the Maduro regime.
00:22:22.880and then over time, potentially engaging in a transition that is not based on some desire to
00:22:30.820impose liberalism and democracy on Venezuela, but is based on what is ultimately best for the
00:22:37.580security and stability of Venezuela and the Western hemisphere. And that is what should
00:22:43.640dictate it, not some desire to impose the Venezuelan opposition on the Venezuelan people.
00:22:50.700and they may be elected in a future election at some point. But right now, the primary focus of
00:22:57.460the administration seems to be ensuring that Venezuela does not collapse and that there is
00:23:03.480stability. And I think that is the right approach, despite what you're starting to see some neocons
00:23:09.140advocating, which is engaging in a full-on regime change in Venezuela. And they're not hiding from
00:23:14.120that term. They're using that term, we should do a regime change in Venezuela. And fortunately,
00:23:19.760right now, the Trump administration does not seem to be taking that advice.
00:23:25.640That's right. And in fact, I remember saying this back during the summer about the regime change
00:23:31.940being an upsell, this idea that going into Iran when they hit the Iran nuclear sites, that that
00:23:39.500was a targeted operation, hit the nuclear sites and withdraw, whereas the neocons came in and said
00:23:44.920they wanted full regime change. I said, well, that's the regime change upsell. They're trying
00:23:48.820to upsell you on this regime change thing. Whereas President Trump said, no, limited operation.
00:23:53.540What are we seeing now in Venezuela? Very similar situation. Targeted operation. Yes. Now it is the
00:23:59.540leader. So I'm not going to sit here and say that it's not, you know, that it's not changing the
00:24:03.520leadership of another country. Obviously it is. And there's no question, but it is not the same
00:24:08.340thing. The regime that's in place, the Bolivar and regime, for lack of a better term, that's been
00:24:14.760in place since Chavez took over in the 90s. This is still largely the infrastructure of Venezuela.
00:24:20.820And I applaud the president for understanding that keeping it stable is much better than letting it
00:24:26.540completely descend into the madness of another, you know, a rack in the tropics. We just don't
00:24:33.800need it. We don't need an Iraq in the tropics. And one of the reasons, by the way, and I think
00:24:38.220everybody knows this from the president on down, we talked about it before. What do we always say
00:24:42.180here on Human Events Daily. If you want to understand world geopolitics, chercher la
00:24:48.240petrol. The French have a phrase, chercher la femme, look for the girl. And over here,
00:24:52.300we say chercher la petrol, look for the oil. And let's put up a chart break, ladies and
00:24:59.280gentlemen, because crude oil reserves, Venezuela, some of the largest absolutely in the world,
00:25:07.320303 billion barrels, larger than the Saudis, larger than Iran, larger than the Canadian oil
00:25:16.060sands. Although there's some dispute about whether Canada has more larger than Iraq, UAE, Kuwait,
00:25:22.000Russia, the United States, Libya, larger than all of them. This is one of the keys here. And yes,
00:25:29.320the economics of extracting Venezuelan oil are kind of tricky because it's a heavy oil. It's a
00:25:35.460dirty oil, the crude. So it requires much more refining. And what better refineries? And so,
00:25:41.820of course, you're going to see the Texas oil barons looking down saying, well, what better
00:25:45.540spot to refine that than right here in the Gulf of America? So clearly, there are economic interests
00:25:50.980at play. And we're not going to sit here and say this isn't about that. But if you want that
00:25:55.600to make sense, which, by the way, and Dan, just in the final minute here before the break,
00:26:00.220we had a relationship with Venezuela for years prior to the current embargo.
00:26:06.120Correct. And a military relationship. They are still flying American F-16s.
00:26:11.520And if you look at some of the post-raid pictures from Maduro's compound, there were American
00:26:19.460armored personnel carriers there. We had a very close relationship with the military
00:26:23.860for years, up until the 2002 coup that was an attempt to overthrow Chavez, and it failed.
00:26:31.560So we had a long economic and military relationship with Venezuela,
00:26:36.360really until the election of Hugo Chavez in the late 1990s.
00:26:42.440And so there it is, folks. The idea is, turn that on. Citgo going to be expanding in the U.S.
00:26:49.200We will see, or Chevron, I should say, Chevron expanding in the U.S.
00:27:19.200don't we have an incredible thing we're always talking about the fake news and the bad but we
00:27:23.120have guys and these are the guys should be getting policies all right jack posopic we are back live
00:27:33.040human events daily getting some emails in now on these on our question of the day what do you think
00:27:38.840of the u.s policy in venezuela uh some people first one in uh from jeff uh he says terrible
00:27:45.760slippery slope to forever war then i'm also seeing people then we got another one in from mongoose
00:27:51.880um well it's not okay for cuba a proxy for china russia to control venezuela but it was wrong for
00:27:58.740the u.s to do but you think but people think it was wrong to do anything about it and let's go
00:28:04.600back and forth here from from paul overthrow annex it as they like to say encourage our latin
00:28:12.180population to go and establish a new american colony we're accused of it maybe we should
00:28:16.980actually do it venezuelica uh jeff another jeff we should put a long straw straight into the ground
00:28:25.480that sucks the oil right out of the ground and brings it straight to the u.s so it's a
00:28:29.240reference to there will be blood um email from tony i think any war that lessens the likelihood
00:28:35.760My kid will overdose on fentanyl is a fight worth fighting.
00:28:40.100So talking about these, you know, the the fentanyl trafficking that was coming in from DN 25 years ago, the CIA would have done this as a covert action.
00:28:50.060But that's not Trump style. I like that.
00:28:51.940However, so long as the CIA is actively trafficking in drugs, I don't see how it changes anything.
00:28:57.400Many countries are responsible for trafficking drugs into the U.S.
00:29:00.780email from Schiff head. If we can get Maduro, why are Schiff and Pelosi walking around?
00:29:11.600Another Jeff. That's like the third Jeff. What's up with all these Jeffs?
00:29:16.200Venezuela, the new U.S. territory. Let them vote for statehood. Yeah, I'm totally against that.
00:29:20.580I want to get Dan Caldwell back in here. So, Dan, we're hearing, you know, just just in my own,
00:29:25.820you know, kind of like, you know, AB testing there. You know, it seems that it seems that
00:29:31.000conservatives are somewhat divided on this. Some people saying they're totally for it. They like
00:29:36.700it. They like the oil extraction. Other people saying that they like it because they believe
00:29:41.360it's going to reduce fentanyl in the United States, stop the drug trafficking, or at least,
00:29:45.840you know, partially. And others saying, of course, that, you know, that this is great,
00:29:50.940shut down the strategic elements of China, of Russia coming into the area. Another person I'm
00:29:57.280seeing mentioned, Laken Riley, of course, and others who have been affected by Trendy Aragua
00:30:02.900and other illegal aliens and these gangs, cartels coming out of Venezuela. So when we look at all of
00:30:09.780this, when we look at all of this, what's the big picture for the American people and American
00:30:15.000interests in these operations? Look, I think what those emails lay out and what a lot of your
00:30:23.760listeners and viewers are saying and working through is actually healthy. Because, look,
00:30:31.020I think that it is good to be inherently skeptical at the outset of any type of offensive
00:30:38.720military action, particularly considering the history of the last 30 years. However,
00:30:44.620that doesn't mean that military action, military options should always be off the table.
00:30:50.800And when we're talking about our own hemisphere, the stakes are fundamentally different, and I
00:30:58.020would say higher than in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, Eastern Europe, Ukraine, is that
00:31:05.960what matters here is absolutely critical to our safety and our prosperity. And so
00:31:14.320what was going on in Venezuela when it comes to the degradation of the Venezuelan government
00:31:22.400and the immiseration of the Venezuelan people and the refugee flows that that created and the
00:31:29.220emergence of more and more drug organizations in Venezuela that had a negative impact on the
00:31:37.340United States that needed to be acknowledged and ultimately in some way dealt with. And so
00:31:44.260when you're looking at Venezuela, I would say is that absolutely immediately when you see a
00:31:49.920military operation is first and foremost, you should pray for the safety of our troops in the
00:31:55.560middle of that operation, but it is not a bad thing to be skeptical. However, it needs to be
00:32:01.780acknowledged that not every part of the world means the same thing to the United States.
00:32:08.100And when it comes to our own hemisphere, we have more interests at stake. And whether it's ensuring
00:32:15.080that foreign powers can't use our own hemisphere to hurt American safety, to degrade our economic
00:32:24.100prosperity or use it as a way to undermine our society through things like drugs or immigration
00:32:33.460or other types of criminal enterprises. So when you're looking at the situation in Venezuela,
00:32:40.740you should apply the lessons from Iraq and Afghanistan and Libya, but there's not a perfect
00:32:46.300apples to apples comparison. And you need to take each situation differently. And I just finally say
00:32:52.920is that if you go back to our founding and really the first 150 years of our foreign policy,
00:32:59.960almost the sole focus of our foreign policy up until World War I was what happened in our
00:33:06.820Western Hemisphere, because our founding fathers knew that it was important that the United States
00:33:12.940be the dominant power in our own hemisphere, and that it is not used by foreign powers or
00:33:19.340ultimately non-state actors to undermine our security. So this is part of a long tradition
00:33:24.820of American foreign policy. And it's really a return to the foreign policy that made
00:33:30.540America successful and helped us become strong. So that's how I would encourage people to look
00:33:36.780at it. Now, again, we don't know what the future holds for Venezuela. We should all hope that the
00:33:44.140Trump administration is successful. Even if you disagreed with the operation, you should be rooting
00:33:49.000for its success and talking about what the administration should be doing to be successful.
00:33:53.980And there's a lot of mistakes that could be made. But we have to acknowledge that what happens here
00:34:01.120in our own hemisphere is fundamentally important and should be looked at differently than other
00:34:08.300parts of the world. I certainly agree. And that's why when people have talked about when President
00:34:15.720Trump gave it one of his first speeches at the end of the campaign. So he wins the campaign,
00:34:21.500flies out to Arizona, and he speaks on stage at Turning Point at the America Fest out there.
00:34:27.700And he comes up and I'm sitting there, I don't know, probably like row two, row three. I've got
00:34:31.800my family and I got producer Fos next to me. And for the first time all year in 2024, President
00:34:38.300Trump starts talking about the Panama Canal. And I just got up out of my seat, put up to put up
00:34:45.160two arms and started clapping and said, yes, that is our canal and it deserves, it is ours by right.
00:34:52.780It is ours by right of creation. We are the ones who made it. It is ridiculous. It is a national
00:34:59.240embarrassment that the United States does not maintain full control of the Panama Canal. And
00:35:05.800as such, it should be ours. And I've said for years, just park an aircraft carrier,
00:35:10.920one in the Atlantic, one in the Pacific, until it is turned back over.
00:38:47.060Yeah, an incredible day here, historic day in lower Manhattan.
00:38:51.260And as you know, Maduro and his wife, Cecilia, were flown from the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn to the courthouse this morning, but left by convoy.
00:39:02.820And I think they came by helicopter this morning to avoid logistics snares and rush hour traffic.
00:39:08.340First day back from the New Year holiday, right, for workers here in New York City and other.
00:39:15.960There was some drama in the courtroom at the end.
00:39:18.000Now, I was in the overflow room next door because there was hundreds of media trying to get in there.
00:39:22.440But we heard at the end, someone in the audience shouted out,
00:39:26.160you're going to pay for what you've done.
00:39:27.640I believe that person was escorted out, and on his way out, Maduro was saying,
00:39:32.140you know, I'm a prisoner of war, and I could give you a little bit of the summary
00:39:36.440of what happened in the arraignment, if you want, and other.
00:39:41.260Well, sure, we do want to hear that because I think, in general,
00:39:45.100People want to know what exactly are the charges that he is facing and what essentially the penalties will be if he's if he's convicted.
00:39:57.260Yes. And Nicholas Maduro was flanked by Barry Pollack of Julian Assange.
00:40:03.200You know, he represented him along with Marty Tankleff, who was accused of killing his parents in the 80s and high end lawyer.
00:40:09.800And he said that Maduro was a victim of a military abduction during the arraignment.
00:40:19.120And, you know, Judge Hellerstein is in there.
00:40:21.600And he's the judge that denied Trump to move the trial from state to federal for the hush money.
00:40:26.820He also blocked the Alien Enemies Act in 1798 to deport a legion of Trinidad Agua.
00:40:31.020But this indictment has been going on for about 14, 15 years in New York City with the Southern District here.
00:40:39.100And it's just something to note that the judge asked Nicholas Maduro and his wife if they wanted bail, and Maduro said no, not at this time.
00:40:51.740They may put an application in writing for that.
00:40:54.920Also, a lot of other things were discussed.
00:40:56.840He was informed of his rights, that he should know he can talk to his consulate and others for communication purposes.
00:41:07.180This is part of the 2011 Southern District case that Hellestein presided over.
00:41:13.480They just convicted General Armando Caraval Barrios, right, from the Nones El Pollo, the chicken.
00:41:21.460He worked with Hugo Chavez, and he was indicted.
00:41:25.100And I don't know if he cut a deal or not, but he might get life in prison.
00:41:29.000But his sentencing is going to be next week, and it's similar charges to Maduro.
00:41:33.220Now, this was a superseding indictment to the original indictment for Maduro from 2020, which added charges, added people into this, including Maduro's son and known as Nicolás Cito and former Minister of Interior Justice Ramón Rodriguez-Chaquín and Hector Flores, who said that he was a leader of Chenda y Araguan.
00:41:54.220And I guess they're trying to make the connection, the prosecution here between actual kidnappings and murder and human rights and all kinds of other stuff,
00:42:01.880maybe even expanding the superseding indictment going forward.
00:42:05.840I'm not sure, but they're trying to make that connection here.
00:42:10.780And I remember that when the DNI put out their report a while back, Joe Kent,
00:42:15.440And this became a huge point of contention in the media as to whether or not Maduro was directly operating and executing Trendy Aragua's missions.
00:42:27.280Were they acting on behalf of the regime or were they acting with the support of the regime or simply with the blessing of the regime?
00:42:37.440So we see the charges, narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, the weapons charges.
00:42:42.980So whether or not they're able to provide the evidence on this will probably get back to the heart of what Joe Kent was saying back in that ODNI report to say that we do have this connection.
00:42:54.500Now, the DOJ is going to have to put that together.
00:42:56.260The Southern District of New York, of course, would be able to do that as well.
00:43:02.060And, you know, and it certainly looks like he would be facing decades in prison at the very least should he be found guilty on all this.
00:43:11.500David, do you know when is their next hearing, when is their next arraignment?
00:43:17.020Yeah, they're going to reconvene on March 17th. There's about a 60-day reprieve here.
00:43:22.740I think they're going to start the discovery process. We probably won't see a trial date for some time.
00:43:28.000Within that time, he may ask for bail. I'm not sure.
00:43:31.180And just to note, Jack, that corruption and violence, including selling of diplomatic passports to cartels
00:43:36.980and ordering kidnappings and murders are part of this indictment.
00:43:40.580like you said, now they got to prove it, but a dramatic day in court here, and Celia Flores
00:43:46.520claiming she received injuries, and her lawyer saying she might have a fracture during the
00:43:51.780arrest, and that he needs some help, Nicholas Maduro, he may have underlying medical conditions,
00:43:57.040a lot going on inside the courthouse, Patrick Moynihan courthouse here, 500 Pearl Street in
00:44:02.040Lower Manhattan. All right, David Zier, thank you very much for your intrepid reporting on a day
00:44:09.160that I know is a little bit chilly up there in New York.
00:44:35.580This is happening whether you like it or not.
00:44:38.340The question is, there are a lot of people, and I see these emails, and I'm going to go back to them because I want to pull this up a little bit more.
00:44:47.160People saying, here's another one from Leon.