Trump says US captured Venezuela’s Maduro after ‘large-scale strike’ on capital

CARACAS, Venezuela — The US attacked Venezuela and deposed its long-serving autocratic President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday, President Donald Trump said, in Washington’s most direct intervention in Latin America since the 1989 invasion of Panama.

“The United States of America has successfully carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicolas Maduro, who has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the country,” Trump said in a Truth Social post.

Ahead of the overnight strikes, the US had accused Maduro of running a “narco-state” and rigging Venezuela’s 2024 election, which the opposition said it won overwhelmingly.

The Venezuelan leader, a 63-year-old former bus driver handpicked by the dying Hugo Chavez to succeed him in 2013, had denied those claims and said Washington was intent on taking control of his nation’s oil reserves, the largest in the world.

The US has not made such a direct intervention in Latin America since the invasion of Panama 37 years ago to depose military leader Manuel Noriega over similar allegations.

Multiple explosions rang out and low-flying aircraft swept through Caracas, the capital, as Maduro’s government immediately accused the United States of attacking civilian and military installations. The Venezuelan government called it an “imperialist attack” and urged citizens to take to the streets.

It was not immediately clear who was running the country. Trump announced the developments on Truth Social shortly after 4:30 a.m. Eastern Time. Under Venezuelan law, the vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, would take power.

There was no confirmation that had happened, though she did issue a statement after the strike.

“We do not know the whereabouts of President Nicolas Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores,” Rodriguez said. “We demand proof of life.”

STATEMENT FROM PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP pic.twitter.com/nHDqtsqRFh

— Karoline Leavitt (@PressSec) January 3, 2026

According to the country’s ruling party leader, Nahum Fernández, Maduro and his wife were at their home within the Fuerte Tiuna military installation when they were captured.

“That’s where they bombed,” he said. “And, there, they carried out what we could call a kidnapping of the president and the first lady of the country.”

Trump corroborated this account in a telephone interview with Fox News later Saturday, saying that Maduro was captured from a highly guarded “fortress.”

The US president added that the troops involved in the operation suffered a few injuries and no deaths.

“I mean, I watched it, literally, like I was watching a television show. And if you would have seen the speed, the violence,” Trump said, adding that the daring raid by US special forces shows that Washington is “not going to be pushed around.”

Asked about US involvement in Venezuela’s affairs after Maduro’s capture, Trump said: “We’ll be involved in it very much. And we want to do liberty for the people.”

Also commenting on the operation, Vice President JD Vance said that the US “offered multiple off-ramps, but was very clear throughout this process: the drug trafficking must stop, and the stolen oil must be returned to the United States.”

“Maduro is the newest person to find out that President Trump means what he says,” Vance said on X.

As for the prosecution of Maduro, US Attorney General Pam Bondi said that he and his wife will face “the full wrath of American justice” under drug and terrorism charges, adding that the Maduros already face charges in New York federal court on existing “Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy” charges.

Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, have been indicted in the Southern District of New York. Nicolas Maduro has been charged with Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess…

— Attorney General Pamela Bondi (@AGPamBondi) January 3, 2026

Legal implications

The legal implications of the strike under US law were not immediately clear. Republican Senator Mike Lee posted on X that he had spoken with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who briefed him on the strike. Rubio told Lee that Maduro “has been arrested by US personnel to stand trial on criminal charges in the United States.”

The White House did not immediately respond to queries on where Maduro and his wife were being flown to. Maduro was indicted in March 2020 on “narco-terrorism” conspiracy charges in the Southern District of New York.

Maduro last appeared on state television Friday while meeting with a delegation of Chinese officials in Caracas.

The explosions in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital, early on the third day of 2026 — at least seven blasts — sent people rushing into the streets, while others took to social media to report hearing and seeing the explosions. It was not immediately clear if there were casualties on either side. The attack itself lasted less than 30 minutes and it was unclear if more actions lay ahead, though Trump said in his post that the strikes were carried out “successfully.”

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a ban on US commercial flights in Venezuelan airspace because of “ongoing military activity” ahead of the explosions.

The strike came after the Trump administration spent months escalating pressure on Maduro. The CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels — the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil since the US began strikes in September.

For months, Trump had threatened that he could soon order strikes on targets on Venezuelan land following months of attacks on boats accused of carrying drugs. Maduro has decried the US military operations as a thinly veiled effort to oust him from power.

Some streets in Caracas fill up

Armed individuals and uniformed members of a civilian militia took to the streets of a Caracas neighborhood long considered a stronghold of the ruling party. But in other areas of the city, the streets remained empty hours after the attack. Parts of the city remained without power, but vehicles moved freely.

Video obtained from Caracas and an unidentified coastal city showed tracers and smoke clouding the landscape sky as repeated muted explosions illuminated the night sky. Other footage showed an urban landscape with cars passing on a highway as blasts illuminated the hills behind them. Unintelligible conversation could be heard in the background. The videos were verified by The Associated Press.

Smoke was seen rising from the hangar of a military base in Caracas, while another military installation in the capital was without power.

“The whole ground shook. This is horrible. We heard explosions and planes,” said Carmen Hidalgo, a 21-year-old office worker, her voice trembling. She was walking briskly with two relatives, returning from a birthday party. “We felt like the air was hitting us.”

Venezuela’s government responded to the attack with a call to action. “People to the streets!” it said in a statement. “The Bolivarian Government calls on all social and political forces in the country to activate mobilization plans and repudiate this imperialist attack.”

The statement added that Maduro had “ordered all national defense plans to be implemented” and declared “a state of external disturbance.” That state of emergency gives him the power to suspend people’s rights and expand the role of the armed forces.

The website of the US Embassy in Venezuela, a post that has been closed since 2019, issued a warning to American citizens in the country, saying it was “aware of reports of explosions in and around Caracas.”

“US citizens in Venezuela should shelter in place,” the warning said.

Questions from Congress

Inquiries to the Pentagon and US Southern Command since Trump’s social media post went unanswered. The FAA warned all commercial and private US pilots that the airspace over Venezuela and the small island nation of Curacao, just off the coast of the country to the north, was off limits “due to safety-of-flight risks associated with ongoing military activity.”

Lee posted his potential concerns, reflecting a view from the right flank in Congress. “I look forward to learning what, if anything, might constitutionally justify this action in the absence of a declaration of war or authorization for the use of military force,” Lee said on X.

It was not clear if the US Congress had been officially notified of the strikes.

Están bombardeando Caracas! pic.twitter.com/dH5Dk9A4NS

— Andrés David (@xooxvaez2) January 3, 2026

The Armed Services committees in both houses of Congress, which have jurisdiction over military matters, have not been notified by the administration of any actions, according to a person familiar with the matter and granted anonymity to discuss it.

Lawmakers from both political parties in Congress have raised deep reservations and flat-out objections to the US attacks on boats suspected of drug smuggling on boats near the Venezuelan coast and the Congress has not specifically approved an authorization for the use of military force for such operations in the region.

Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau said the military action and seizure of Maduro marks “a new dawn for Venezuela,” saying that “the tyrant is gone.” He posted on X hours after the strike. His boss, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, reposted a post from July that said Maduro “is NOT the President of Venezuela and his regime is NOT the legitimate government.”

The US military has been attacking boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean since early September. As of Friday, the number of known boat strikes is 35 and the number of people killed is at least 115, according to numbers announced by the Trump administration.

They followed a major buildup of American forces in the waters off South America, including the arrival in November of the nation’s most advanced aircraft carrier, which added thousands more troops to what was already the largest military presence in the region in generations.

Trump has justified the boat strikes as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the US and asserted that the US is engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels.