President Donald Trump on Wednesday confirmed he had authorized CIA action in Venezuela, and indicated his administration is exploring land strikes inside the South American country.
Trump said he could not give more information on the covert CIA operations, which were first reported by the New York Times, but said he authorized them because of the flow of migrants and drugs from the country.
“I authorized for two reasons, really. Number one, they have emptied their prisons into the United States of America. They came in through the, well, they came in through the border,” Trump said as he took reporter questions in the Oval Office.
“And the other thing are drugs, we have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela, and a lot of the Venezuelan drugs come in through the sea. So, you get to see that, but we’re going to stop them by land also,” Trump added.
When asked whether the CIA was given the authority to “take out” Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, Trump called it a “ridiculous” question for him to respond to.
“But I think Venezuela is feeling heat. But I think a lot of other countries are feeling heat too. We’re not going to let this country, our country, be ruined because other people want to drop, as you say, their worst,” Trump said.
Asked what’s next for his administration’s “war” on drug cartels and whether they were considering strikes on land, Trump said they were looking into it.
“Well, I don’t want to tell you exactly, but we are certainly looking at land now because we’ve got the sea very well under control,” the president said.
On Tuesday, Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted a video of another lethal strike on alleged drug boat from Venezuela.
Since Sept. 2, Trump has ordered military strikes on at least five boats in the Caribbean Sea that the administration insists, without providing evidence, were carrying drugs to the U.S. The use of lethal of military force against drug boats is unprecedented and raises legal questions. Past administrations have relied on law enforcement to interdict drug shipments.
During the event in the Oval Office, Trump was pressed about how the administration knows that the boats have drugs and drug traffickers on them, and Trump insisted that the administration was sure though he didn’t provide any evidence.
When asked why the administration isn’t having the Coast Guard stop the boats, Trump replied, “Because we’ve been doing that for 30 years and it has been totally ineffective.”
“They have faster boats. Some of these boats are seriously — I mean, they’re world class speedboats — but they’re not faster than missiles,” Trump said.
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