5
#000000
#FFFFFF
War & Peace
Trump Briefed On Venezuela Military Strike Options That Could Occur in 'Coming Days': Report
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly showed the president options for military operations, including "strikes on land."
Nov 13, 2025
The fact that the White House has reportedly made no "final decision" regarding whether it will launch direct strikes against Venezuela offered cold comfort, suggested one policy advocate on Thursday as it was reported that top military officials had briefed President Donald Trump on "options" for attacking the South American country after weeks of US escalation.
"They're presenting options to Trump for war in Venezuela—options that Trump has already rightly expressed reservations about, and options that just days ago they told Republican allies in Congress that they do not have legal authority to do," said Erik Sperling, executive director of Just Foreign Policy and a former adviser to US Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.). "But sure, no 'final' decision made."
As CBS News reported, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine were among the senior military officials who spoke to Trump Wednesday about potential operations that could be carried out in Venezuela "in the coming days," including "strikes on land."
The meeting came as the USS Gerald R. Ford arrived in the Latin America region, accompanied by warships. The arrival of the carrier strike force brings the number of US troops in the region to 15,000.
Since September, the White House has embarked on what it has called an "armed conflict" with drug cartels in Venezuela over the strong objections of Democrats and a small number of Republicans in Congress.
The conflict has been characterized by the administration's strikes on numerous boats in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific, that the White House has claimed were carrying drugs and operated by cartels. The administration has not released evidence that the people on board the boats were involved in drug trafficking, and legal experts and lawmakers have condemned what they call the "extrajudicial killing" of at least 76 people.
The Associated Press reported on the identities of some of the victims last week and found that they included an out-of-work bus driver and a fisherman who was desperate to feed his family. The family of one victim from Trinidad and Tobago denied that he had been involved in drug trafficking. Two people survived the strikes and were repatriated to Ecuador and Colombia; in the case of the man from Ecuador, authorities released him after finding no evidence he had committed any crime.
Lawmakers in the US Senate have introduced two war powers resolutions to stop Trump from bombing purported drug trafficking boats and from striking Venezuela, but both have been voted down.
The measure focused on Venezuela was voted down after Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio briefed "select members of Congress" and told them the administration is not planning to strike the country and did not have a legal rationale for doing so.
Trump recently told "60 Minutes" that he doubted the US would launch a military attack on the country.
Sperling said Rubio, who has long advocated regime change in Venezuela, appeared "deflated" when speaking to reporters on Thursday and declining to "discuss any possibility of striking Venezuela or arresting [President Nicolás] Maduro."
Despite the aircraft's carrier arrival to the Caribbean, Rubio seems deflated — as he declines to discuss any possibility of striking Venezuela or arresting Maduro.
Seems likely that Trump rightly rejected proposals for a Libya-style regime change or Black Hawk Down-style raid https://t.co/phPXUNIRx8 pic.twitter.com/CgP1w9OE13
— Erik Sperling 🌍 (@ErikSperling) November 13, 2025
"Seems likely that Trump rightly rejected proposals for a Libya-style regime change or Black Hawk Down-style raid," said Sperling.
But Maduro has not been convinced by claims that the US is not planning a strike, and his government announced Wednesday that it was readying its entire military arsenal and deploying 200,000 soldiers to prepare for potential acts of war from the US.
While Trump has appeared to reject proposals to attack Venezuela thus far, he said in 2023 that if he had won the 2020 election, he would have taken the country over and seized its vast oil reserves.
"If Trump rejected Rubio's plans for regime change war in Venezuela, he made the right call," said Just Foreign Policy on social media Thursday. "Former President Barack Obama reportedly wanted to stay out of Libya, but was pressured by advisers—a decision he regretted. Trump must not make the same mistake with Rubio's Venezuela war."
Keep Reading
Show Less
JB Pritzker Warns Trump Would ‘Take Us to War With Venezuela’ to Distract From Epstein
"He’s going to do everything in his power to distract,” said the Illinois governor.
Nov 13, 2025
As President Donald Trump escalated tensions in the Caribbean with its deployment of an aircraft carrier and warships, one of his top critics in the Democratic Party warned that Trump could follow through on earlier threats to strike Venezuela as newly released documents shed light on a topic the White House has sought to keep secret: the details of the president's friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“My great fear, of course, is that with the release of that information, which I think will be devastating for Trump, he’s going to do everything in his power to distract,” Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker told the Associated Press on Wednesday. “What does that mean? I mean, he might take us to war with Venezuela just to get a distraction in the news and take it out of the headlines.”
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a series of emails in which Epstein, who died in prison in 2019, told a friend he spent Thanksgiving 2017 with Trump, informed a former New York Times journalist he had a "photo of donald and girls in bikinis," and suggested he had briefed Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, on Trump in 2018.
Trump has long claimed he cut ties with Epstein in the mid-2000s after Epstein recruited girls at the president's Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago.
After the Democrats released the emails, the Republican-controlled committee disclosed 20,000 pages of messages from the financier, who was arrested on federal sex trafficking charges in 2019. Those messages, which were obtained from the Epstein estate in response to a subpoena, included a comment from Epstein that he was “the one able to take [Trump] down" and suggestions that he had knowledge of the president's real estate and business dealings.
Epstein also told journalist Michael Wolff of Trump, "Of course he knew about the girls." He told his longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell, who was also convicted of helping Epstein with his sex trafficking operation, that the president was "the dog that hasn't barked" in a 2011 email and said Trump had spent "hours at my house" with one of Epstein's well-known victims, Virginia Giuffre.
Pritzker on Wednesday demanded the full release of the Epstein files, saying Trump was "silent because he knows what's inside."
The release of the documents came after months of demands from Democrats that the US Department of Justice fully disclose files related to the Epstein case, which they believe would implicate Trump.
On Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said he plans to hold a vote next week on releasing the files. Johnson finally swore in Rep. Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz.) on Wednesday after a weekslong delay he tried to blame on the government shutdown and Grijalva promptly became the 218th lawmaker to sign a discharge petition forcing the vote.
The president said late Wednesday that "the Democrats are using the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax to try and deflect from their massive failures."
But as Pritzker pointed out, the new developments in the Epstein saga follow the Trump administration's threats against Venezuela and his bombings of boats in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific Ocean—strikes that have killed at least 76 people and have been denounced by legal experts and Democratic lawmakers as extrajudicial killings.
The bombings have been part of what the administration claims is a campaign to stop drug trafficking out of Venezuela—a country that, according to the United States' own intelligence and law enforcement agencies, plays virtually no role in the trafficking of fentanyl, the leading cause of overdoses in the US.
Venezuela is a transit hub for—but not a significant producer of—cocaine, which is sometimes transported via the Caribbean to the US.
But while Trump has claimed to Congress that the US is in "armed conflict" with drug cartels, drug trafficking has long been treated as a law enforcement issue—not one to be confronted through military strikes—with those suspected of transporting illicit substances arrested and their products confiscated by the Coast Guard and other agencies.
Trump has also signaled that the US could attack Venezuela directly and has authorized Central Intelligence Agency operations there, prompting Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to ready the country's entire military arsenal for a potential response on Tuesday. Maduro has accused Trump of seeking "regime change"—which Secretary of State Marco Rubio has long advocated for—and Trump explicitly said in 2023 that he would seek to take control of Venezuela's vast oil reserves if he won the presidency again.
On Wednesday, top military officials reportedly presented Trump options for potential military operations within Venezuela.
Keep Reading
Show Less
Puerto Ricans Continue Protests Against US Militarism and War Threats
“We are against any type of military intervention in the country of Venezuela, and above all we are against the vile and terrible assassinations of our fishermen brothers," said one protester.
Nov 12, 2025
Protests continued Tuesday in Puerto Rico against the US military buildup and attacks on alleged drug-running boats in the Caribbean Sea, as well as the Trump administration's warmongering toward Venezuela.
Since September, Puerto Ricans have been protesting the reactivation of former US bases like Roosevelt Roads in Ceiba, increased operations at Muñiz Air National Guard Base and other sites, airstrikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean, and Trump's deployment of warships and thousands of troops to the region for possible attacks on Venezuela. Trump has also authorized covert CIA action against the government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
“We are against US imperialism, we are against any type of military intervention in the country of Venezuela, and above all we are against the vile and terrible assassinations of our fishermen brothers that have happened with the pretext that they are boats for drug traffickers," explained protester Enrique Rivera Zambrana, a resident of the southeastern town of Arroyo. "We condemn those killings, and terrible actions. We are in favor of peace.”
En Puerto Rico se siguen llevando a cabo protestas contra los entrenamientos militares que el Gobierno de Trump está realizando en las playas de Arroyo, una localidad situada en el sureste de la isla.
En las últimas semanas, los residentes de Puerto Rico han revelado haber visto… pic.twitter.com/cT2QMiHNxN
— Democracy Now! en español (@DemocracyNowEs) November 12, 2025
Tuesday's protest was also held in honor of Ángel Rodríguez Cristóbal, a Puerto Rican revolutionary who was found dead in a Florida prison—where he was serving a six-month sentence for opposing the US Navy occupation and bombing of Vieques, Puerto Rico—on November 11, 1979. While US authorities said Rodríguez killed himself, many critics believe he was assassinated.
US Marines began large-scale amphibious warfare exercises involving hundreds of troops at the end of August as part of Trump's remilitarization of the region amid his military buildup against Venezuela. There are currently around 10,000 troops on the island—which was conquered from Spain in 1898—as well as weapons including F-35 fighter jets, MQ-9 Reaper drones, surveillance aircraft, and support equipment.
The US buildup has evoked memories of the fight to kick the Navy out of Vieques, a picture-postcard island whose residents lived downwind from a US bombing range for six decades. Tens of thousands of tons of bombs were dropped. Deadly chemical weapons were tested and stored. Toxins polluted the land, air, and sea, including Agent Orange, depleted uranium, and so-called forever chemicals.
There was little that Puerto Ricans—who were denied political representation in Washington, DC—could do about it. When the Navy finally left in 2003, it left behind a legacy of illness including cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, as well as an infant mortality rate 55% higher than in the rest of the territory.
Vieques octopus fisher José Silva recently told Centro de Periodismo Investigativo (CPI) that the new buildup "is like bringing back the monster of the bombings" of the island.
Another Vieques resident, Yamilette Meléndez, said the renewed US presence brought back childhood memories of hiding under her bed whenever warplanes flew overhead.
“The trauma comes back,” she said. “It comes back because for years we lived with the sound of bombs, planes at all hours, while sleeping, at school."
"I thought of my children, of the anxiety," she added. "It’s something you can’t control, because I grew up with it. And I was just a girl then. Imagine how it feels for the older folks who lived through the real struggle.”
The US military brings other forms of violence to Puerto Rico.
“Some of the soldiers who were recently working at the airport approached local businesses and several people, asking if there were sex workers in Vieques," Judith Conde Pacheco, co-founder of the Vieques Women’s Alliance, told CPI. "It’s one of the most brutal forms of violence… women’s bodies are seen as part of the occupied land."
Some Puerto Ricans dismissed the idea that the buildup on what's often called the US' "unsinkable aircraft carrier" signaled any sort of resurgence in the colonizers' presence.
“The idea that the US military is no longer present in Puerto Rico is a myth," former Puerto Rico Bar Association president Alejandro Torres Rivera told CPI. "They never left, they merely scaled back their presence, or the intensity of it, for a time in their colony."
Condemning the buildup and the acquiescence of the territorial government in a Newsweek opinion piece last month, US Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez (D-NY)—the first Puerto Rican woman to serve in Congress—wrote: "The potential remilitarization of Puerto Rico is not progress; it is regression. It marks a step backwards in the struggle for Puerto Rico’s sovereignty."
"To those who celebrate this militarization, or remain complicit, I say: There is no worse bet than one made against your own people, your own land, your own future," she added. "If only someone would dare to bet on Puerto Ricans, and their right to decide their destiny. After generations of allowing others to exploit Puerto Rico, and abandon it without justice, we have had enough."
Keep Reading
Show Less
Venezuela Mobilizes Military as US Aircraft Carrier Approaches
“The only reason to move it there is to use it against Venezuela,” said one policy expert of the deployment of the USS Gerald R. Ford.
Nov 12, 2025
White House officials have sought to walk back President Donald Trump's repeated threats against Venezuela in recent days—even as the Department of Defense has continue to strike boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific—but officials in the South American country on Tuesday took the arrival of a US aircraft carrier in the region seriously despite the administration's claims that it won't target Venezuela directly.
As the USS Gerald R. Ford entered waters near Latin America, accompanied by three warships, Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López said Venezuela's entire military arsenal had been placed on "full operational readiness," with President Nicolás Maduro ordering the deployment of nearly 200,000 soldiers.
The government also approved the “massive deployment of ground, aerial, naval, riverine, and missile forces," López announced.
Venezuela's military deployment comes weeks after US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the Ford to relocate from Europe to Latin America following several military strikes on boats in the Caribbean and Pacific that the Trump administration has claimed are meant to stop drug trafficking out of Venezuela—despite the fact that US intelligence agencies and United Nations experts agree that the country plays virtually no role in the trafficking of fentanyl, the top cause of drug overdoses in the US.
At least 76 people have been killed in the strikes so far, and the Associated Press reported last week that the victims have included an out-of-work bus driver and and a struggling fisherman—people who in some cases had turned to helping drug traffickers transport cocaine across the Caribbean, but were hardly the high-level "narco-terrorists" that Hegseth and Trump have insisted they've killed in the region.
With the carrier strike group entering the Caribbean region, the US now has about 15,000 troops in the area where tensions have escalated since the boat strikes began in September.
Mark Cancian, a senior defense adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the Washington Post that Venezuelan officials had good reason to mobilize forces.
“The only reason to move it there is to use it against Venezuela,” Cancian said of the Ford deployment. "The shot clock has started because this is not an asset they can just keep there indefinitely. They have to use it or move it."
Since beginning the boat bombings, Trump has signaled the US attacks could move to Venezuela directly, with the Wall Street Journal reporting late last month that the administration was preparing to target "ports and airports controlled by the military that are allegedly used to traffic drugs, including naval facilities and airstrips."
Trump also authorized Central Intelligence Agency operations last month, falsely claiming the country has "emptied" its prisons into the US and again asserting that "we have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela."
Democratic senators have introduced two war powers resolutions aimed at stopping the US from striking inside Venezuela and at halting the boat-bombing campaign—but Republicans have voted them down after administration officials assured the caucus that the White House was not currently planning to attack Venezuela.
Maduro said last month that Trump's actions in the region in recent months amount to attempts at "regime change," adding that "if Venezuela did not possess oil, gas, gold, fertile land, and water, the imperialists wouldn’t even look at our country."
Trump himself said publicly in 2023 that if he had won the 2020 presidential election, "we would have taken [Venezuela] over, we would have gotten all that oil."
Trump: When I left, Venezuela was ready to collapse. We would have taken it over, we would have gotten all that oil. pic.twitter.com/5q3Jr1j1Ho
— Acyn (@Acyn) June 10, 2023
On Tuesday, both the United Kingdom and Colombia announced that they were halting intelligence sharing with the US in the region, saying that working with the US as it attacks small vessels in the Caribbean could make the countries complicit in violations of international law.
“All levels of law enforcement intelligence are ordered to suspend communications and other agreements with US security agencies,” Colombian President Gustavo Petro said. “This measure will remain in place as long as missile attacks on boats in the Caribbean continue. The fight against drugs must be subordinate to the human rights of the Caribbean people.”
Keep Reading
Show Less
Most Popular