Maduro’s ouster on drug fees comes as Trump lets others free : NPR

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JIM WATSON/AFP President Trump escalated the U.S. drug conflict in dramatic style early Saturday, ordering the invasion of Venezuela and eradicating that nation's president Nicolás Maduro and his spouse, Cilia Flores, who had been rapidly charged with narcotics trafficking by the U.S. Justice Division.

However the beautiful navy motion comes at a time when Trump has additionally freed or pardoned different convicted drug sellers and other people accused of ties to drug gangs and cartels - notably the previous president of Honduras.

Focusing on a 'marketing campaign of lethal narco-terrorism' Venezuela's Maduro and Flores face fees of "drug trafficking and narco-terrorism conspiracies," in line with an indictment made public by U.S. Lawyer Common Pam Bondi. "They may quickly face the total wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts," Bondi mentioned in a submit on social media.

The Justice Division charged Maduro in March 2020, throughout Trump's first administration, in reference to alleged narcoterrorism and drug smuggling into the USA.

That indictment alleged Maduro was the chief of the Cartel de los Soles, and that he and different defendants took half in a narco-terrorism conspiracy with the Colombian guerrilla group referred to as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

Throughout a Saturday information convention, Trump acknowledged different motives that led him to order the assault, together with his need to grab management of Venezuela's oil fields. However he pointed to drug trafficking as a key issue, accusing Maduro of a "marketing campaign of lethal narco-terrorism towards the USA and its residents."

Nicolas Maduro and his spouse, Cilia Flores, have been indicted within the Southern District of New York. Nicolas Maduro has been charged with Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Damaging Units, and Conspiracy to Possess…

— Lawyer Common Pamela Bondi (@AGPamBondi) January 3, 2026

Since taking workplace, Trump has quickly shifted the battle towards drug overdose deaths within the U.S. from a public well being response to aggressive interdiction efforts led in unprecedented methods by the U.S. navy.

Trump has designated a rising variety of drug cartels as terrorist organizations, ordered the U.S. Navy to focus on alleged drug boats in a collection of lethal strikes, and designated the road opioid fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction.

The shift, and Saturday's navy motion, has drawn reward from conservative supporters.

"[Maduro's capture] is a large enchancment over what we have had, which is a narco-dictatorship, which has been weaponizing medication and mass migration towards the USA," mentioned Andrés Martínez-Fernández, an professional on Latin America on the Heritage Basis, in an announcement posted on social media.

However regardless of Trump's robust rhetoric and actions, he additionally has sparked controversy by a few of his current pardons.

'Utilizing the drug conflict as an excuse' Final month, Trump freed former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez, who had been convicted within the U.S. of serving to smuggle greater than 400 tons of cocaine into the U.S.

Jeffrey Singer, a drug coverage analyst on the libertarian Cato Institute, mentioned given Trump's sample of leniency for some alleged drug criminals, he is skeptical that narcotics interdiction was a severe purpose of Saturday's operation in Venezuela.

"If that is what's motivating [Trump], if it is stopping drug trafficking, why is he pardoning the Honduran president who was convicted of cocaine trafficking? It is by no means been about that," he mentioned.

In line with Singer, it is harmful for the U.S. authorities to make use of legal drug fees as justification for the navy invasion of one other nation, and seizure of a international chief, with out first getting authorization from Congress. "They're mainly utilizing the drug conflict as an excuse," he added.

Throughout his information convention on Saturday, Trump mentioned his resolution to pardon Honduras's former president mirrored his perception that Hernandez was prosecuted unfairly by the Biden administration.

"This was a person who was persecuted very unfairly," he mentioned, with out providing proof. "That man was handled very badly and unfairly, that is why I gave him a pardon."

Robust discuss, but some drug criminals go free However Hernandez is not an remoted case. Throughout his second time period, Trump has pardoned and launched a major variety of different figures concerned in drug trafficking, together with Ross Ulbricht who was serving a life sentence for making a "darkish internet" website referred to as Silk Highway, utilized by drug traffickers.

"Ulbricht intentionally operated Silk Highway as a web based legal market meant to allow its customers to purchase and promote medication and different unlawful items," mentioned the DOJ in a 2015 assertion.

Trump additionally granted clemency to Larry Hoover, 74, who was serving a number of life sentences in federal jail for crimes, together with drug trafficking, linked to his function main the Chicago-based Gangster Disciples.

In August, Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia raised "severe concern" after the Trump administration freed and deported to El Salvador a person named Cesar Humberto Lopez-Lario, accused by the DOJ of being "a high-ranking chief" of the drug gang MS-13. "Such a choice not solely undercuts ongoing federal investigations but additionally threatens U.S. nationwide safety," Garcia wrote.

Beforehand, throughout his first time period within the White Home, Trump's administration additionally freed Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos Zepeda, Mexico's former Secretary of Nationwide Protection in 2020. Cienfuegos confronted accusations within the U.S. of partnering carefully with drug cartels that funneled huge quantities of medication into the U.S.

"There's quite a lot of combined messages and combined indicators [from the White House] which creates form of chaos and uncertainty," mentioned Singer on the Cato Institute, in a Might interview with NPR. "On the one hand you are threatening even harder penalties on individuals who deal in medication, whereas alternatively you are releasing drug sellers from prisons."