President Donald Trump may have already undermined the pretenses under which the U.S. captured Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro and flew him to the U.S. to stand trial on narco-terrorism and weapons charges, according to one expert.
Early Saturday morning, Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were arrested by U.S. authorities at the Venezuelan presidential palace. Shortly after the arrest took place, Attorney General Pam Bondi unsealed an indictment accusing Maduro of being part of a cartel, possessing illegal weapons, and various drug crimes.
David Rothkopf, a columnist for The Daily Beast and a former editor of Foreign Policy Magazine, discussed the operation on a new episode of “The Daily Beast Podcast” on Monday.
He argued that much of what the Trump administration accused Maduro of doing is not true and won’t hold up in court.
“As exquisitely planned as the military operation was, the minute that Maduro was put on a helicopter and flown out of the country, there was no remaining plan,” Rothkopf said. “We don’t know who’s in charge in Venezuela; we don’t know who’s on our side; we don’t know what we’re going to do next; we don’t know how we’re going to control the oil; we don’t know which oil companies are going to participate in this in Venezuela.”
“Frankly, I don’t even think they understand really how the Maduro trial is going to play out, because a lot of what they’re accusing him of isn’t actually true,” he added.
Rothkopf added that the cartel that the U.S. accused Maduro of taking part in is similar to the Antifa group that the Trump administration has gone after.
“It’s just a bunch of people doing activities a little like Antifa,” he said. “It’s not really a thing. They just make it up to be a thing. That’s interesting when you’re doing a press conference. But, you know, in a court of law, that may not hold water.”
“Everything that they said about the operation is a lie, and everything that we intend to do following the operation is disturbing on some level,” he continued.
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