Trump says US ‘hit’ dock in Venezuela, marking first known land attack
U.S. President Donald Trump takes questions during a statement to the media at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate on December 22, 2025 in Palm Beach, Florida. Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump said on Monday that the United States “hit” a dock in Venezuela where drugs were allegedly being loaded onto boats.
The comments came after Trump said in a radio interview last Friday that the U.S. “knocked out” a “big facility” in Venezuela as he touted his administration’s effort to stop drug trafficking from the region, including strikes against alleged drug boats.
“And we just knocked out, I don’t know if you read or you saw, they have a big plant or a big facility where they send the, you know, where the ships come from. Two nights ago we knocked that out, so we hit them very hard,” Trump said on WABC’s “Cats and Cosby,” though he didn’t provide specifics.
If Trump’s comments are accurate, then it would mark the first known attack on land in Venezuela since the Trump administration began its campaign against the country.
On Monday, as he welcomed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to his Mar-a-Lago club, Trump was pressed by a reporter for more details on the strike — including whether the action was carried out by the U.S. military after Trump confirmed in October that he authorized the CIA to operate inside the South American nation.
“Well, it doesn’t matter, but there was a major explosion in the dock area where they load the boats up with drugs,” Trump responded. “They load the boats up with drugs. So we hit all the boats and now we hit the area. It’s the implementation area. That’s where they implement. And that is no longer around.”
ABC News has reached out to the Pentagon and the White House for comment; the Pentagon referred ABC News to the White House for comment. The CIA declined to comment on the matter.
Trump has teased land action in Venezuela for weeks.
The U.S. has also built up its military presence in the region, with 15,000 U.S. troops and several warships standing ready in the Caribbean. Earlier this month, Trump ordered what he called a “complete blockade” of all sanctioned oil tankers going into and out of Venezuela, targeting the government’s main source of revenue.
“He can do whatever he wants, it’s alright, whatever he wants to do. If he wants to do something, if he plays tough, it’ll be the last time he’s ever able to play tough,” Trump said.
Rep. Doug LaMalfa, R-Calif., leaves a meeting of the House Republican Conference at the Capitol Hill Club on Wednesday, January 22, 2025. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — California Republican Rep. Doug LaMalfa has died at the age of 65, according to his office — as President Donald Trump, House Speaker Mike Johnson and Republican leaders reacted Tuesday to the seven-term congressman’s unexpected death.
LaMalfa’s chief of staff, Mark Spannagel, released a statement on behalf of the congressman’s office confirming his death early Tuesday morning.
“Early this morning Congressman Doug LaMalfa returned home to the Lord. He leaves a lasting legacy of servant leadership [and] kindness to the North State,” the statement noted. “His humor and work effort are legendary – with one reporter once saying he’d look in the back yard of every BBQ just to see if Doug was there visiting.”
“Congressman LaMalfa cared deeply for the people he served and worked tirelessly to hold the government to its word to fix our failing forests, build water storage, and leave people to be free to choose what is best for themselves,” the statement continued. “His tragic and unexpected passing leaves a deep impact on many. He leaves behind his amazing wife Jill, four children, one grandchild, two sisters and a host of cousins.”
LaMalfa’s untimely death cuts into Speaker Johnson’s thin majority, with 218 Republicans and 213 Democrats leaving GOP leaders with a two-vote margin. This comes just a day after Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene resigned from office a year before her term was set to expire.
“Congress is devastated to learn this morning about the passing of our dear friend and colleague, Doug LaMalfa,” Johnson, R-La., said in a statement. “Doug was a lifelong resident of northern California and deeply loved its people. He was as fierce of a fighter for his state’s vast natural resources and beauty as we have ever known. We are mourning the loss of our friend and brother today and we send our respects for his life and work to his wife Jill and the LaMalfa family during this difficult time.”
President Trump, speaking Tuesday morning at a House Republican retreat at the recently renamed Kennedy Center, reacted to LaMalfa’s passing — praising him as “a fierce champion on California water issues.”
“Before we go any further, I want to express our tremendous sorrow at the loss of a great member, a great, great, great member: Congressman Doug LaMalfa,” Trump said.
“He was great on water. He wanted to release the water, he’d scream out, and a true defender of American children. He was a defender of everybody. And our hearts go out to his wife, Jill and his entire family,” Trump added.
The president claimed that LaMalfa voted with him “100% of the time” and wasn’t a member that the speaker needed the president to whip into line.
“I spoke to Doug, but I didn’t speak to him about — I mean, I never had a problem,” Trump said. “And I was really, I was really saddened by his passing and was thinking about not even doing the speech in his honor. But then I decided that I have to do it in his honor. I’ll do it in his honor, because he would have wanted it that way.”
Across the aisle, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who took office in 2013 alongside LaMalfa, extended his condolences to the congressman’s family and constituents.
“I join people across Northern California in mourning the untimely passing of Congressman Doug LaMalfa. A fourth-generation rice farmer, Rep. LaMalfa treasured his community, worked powerfully to protect California’s farmers and served those he represented with principled purpose, from the state legislature to the United States House of Representatives,” Jeffries, D-N.Y., stated. “Doug and I joined the Congress as classmates in 2013, and it was an honor to witness firsthand his passion and personal resolve for more than a decade.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, said flags at the California State Capitol will be flown at half-staff in honor of LaMalfa.
“Congressman Doug LaMalfa was a devoted public servant who deeply loved his country, his state, and the communities he represented. While we often approached issues from different perspectives, he fought every day for the people of California with conviction and care. He will be deeply missed,” Newsom said in a statement.
Before coming to Washington, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy not only served in the California state legislature with LaMalfa — the two were roommates.
“Doug was first and foremost a devoted husband and father, inspired by his Christian faith and values to make the lives of others better. Many will remember him as a principled legislator, but he was also a commonsense rice farmer through and through, spending his time in Congress fighting for family farms on agriculture, water, and resource issues, as well as working to eliminate government waste like California’s high-speed rail,” McCarthy wrote on X. “Always thoughtful and affable, Doug was the unanimous choice of his colleagues to lead the Western Caucus in Congress. He will be truly missed.”
President Donald Trump looks on during a meeting of his Cabinet in the Cabinet Room of the White House on December 02, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Amid the news that the U.S. carried out a “large scale strike” on Venezuela overnight Saturday and captured the country’s leader, Nicolas Maduro, Americans may be wondering why Trump, who promised voters no more wars, would launch a risky ground operation to capture a foreign leader.
So far, Trump and his top aides have offered shifting explanations since Trump’s military buildup in Latin America began earlier this year.
Initially, Trump defended his military operations near Venezuela as keeping drugs out of the US, although experts say the cocaine that passes through Venezuela winds up mostly in Europe while fentanyl is sourced from China.
Trump also accused Maduro of emptying Venezuela’s prisons and “mental institutions” into the U.S., although there’s no evidence of that either. According to the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute, hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans have settled in the U.S. in recent years due to economic and political instability in their home country.
By mid-December, Trump accused Maduro of “stealing” U.S. oil and land. Trump appeared to be alluding to work done in the 1970s in Venezuela by Western oil companies before the government there opted to nationalize its reserves, eventually forcing out American companies.
In a Dec. 17 social media post – around the same time sources say Trump was making a decision to greenlight the Jan. 3 military operation — Trump said the U.S. military threat to Venezuela will “only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before — Until such time as they return to the United States of America all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us.”
Trump aide Stephen Miller made a similar claim.
“American sweat, ingenuity and toil created the oil industry in Venezuela. Its tyrannical expropriation was the largest recorded theft of American wealth and property,” Miller wrote on X.
Two days later at a press conference, Secretary of State Marc Rubio offered a more general explanation than access to oil reserves, calling Maduro’s presidency “intolerable” because it was cooperating with “terrorist and criminal elements” instead of the Trump administration.
Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, has staked much of his political career as opposed to the communist Cuban government. He has long blamed Maduro as a primary source of instability in the region, including in Cuba where the regime still relies on Venezuela’s cheap oil.
“There is a regional threat, and in the case of Venezuela we have no cooperation,” Rubio told reporters Dec. 19. “To begin with, it is an illegitimate regime. Second, it is a regime that does not cooperate. It is anti-American in all its statements and actions. And third, it is a regime that not only does not cooperate with us, but also openly cooperates with dangerous, terrorist and criminal elements.”
The Venezuelan government issued a statement condemning what it called “the grave military aggression perpetrated by the current government of the United States of America.”
Donald Trump speaks to the media, as he departs from the White House ahead of his trip to Corpus Christi, Texas, in Washington, D.C., February 27, 2026. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Friday told reporters he hasn’t made a final decision about what comes next in his pressure campaign on Iran but he made clear he was “not happy” with the current negotiations over his demand that Tehran end its nuclear program.
Trump spoke as left the White House for a trip to Texas amid the massive U.S. military buildup he’s ordered in the region.
“I’m not happy with the fact that they’re not willing to give us what we have to have,” Trump said. “So, I’m not thrilled with that. We’ll see what happens with talking later. We’ll — we’ll have some additional talks today. But no, I’m not happy with the way they’re going.”
“Well, we haven’t made a final decision,” he added. “They cannot have nuclear weapons, and we’re not thrilled with the way they’re negotiating. So, we’ll see how it all works.”
Asked if there’s a risk that U.S. strikes could lead to prolonged conflict in the Middle East, Trump said “there’s always a risk. You know, when there’s war, there’s a risk in anything both good and bad.”
Trump, who has yet to explain why he might soon order a strike on Iran and what his overall objective is, also spoke of regime change in Tehran, but only in vague terms.
Asked if his team had told him U.S. strikes now will lead to regime change right away, Trump said no.
“No, nobody’s told me that. You don’t know. I mean, nobody knows. There might be and there might not be,” he said.
Trump repeated that he preferred diplomacy over military action.
“We have the greatest military anywhere in the world. There’s nothing close. I’d love not to use it, but sometimes you have to,” he said.
His remarks came after it was announced earlier Friday that Secretary of State Marco Rubio would travel to Israel on Monday and Tuesday, with rising tensions with Iran said to be high on his agenda.
That trip announcement came just hours after the U.S. embassy in Israel ordered the departure of nonessential employees and family members.
Meanwhile, in an interview aboard Air Force Two on Thursday, Vice President JD Vance told The Washington Post that there was “no chance” of a drawn-out war in Iran as a result of potential strikes that are being weighed by the White House.
“The idea that we’re going to be in a Middle Eastern war for years with no end in sight — there is no chance that will happen,” Vance told the Post.
Vance’s comments come as the U.S. and Iran held indirect talks on Thursday in Geneva, Switzerland, which concluded without a resolution so far.
Vance added that while he doesn’t know what President Donald Trump will do in Iran, he described the range of options as strikes that would “ensure Iran isn’t going to get a nuclear weapon” or actions that could lead to a diplomatic solution.
The vice president told the Post that he remained a “skeptic of foreign military interventions” and said he believed the president was as well. He added that “we all prefer the diplomatic option,” while conceding, “but it really depends on what the Iranians do and what they say.”
Vance dismissed questions from the Post about his past criticisms of the U.S. involvement in Iraq and if he could have foreseen being part of an administration now flirting with the prospect of regime change.
“Well, I mean, look. Life has all kinds of crazy twists and turns,” Vance said. “But I think Donald Trump is an ‘America First’ president, and he pursues policies that work for the American people.”
“I do think we have to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. I also think that we have to avoid overlearning the lessons of the past. Just because one president screwed up a military conflict doesn’t mean we can never engage in military conflict again. We’ve got to be careful about it, but I think the president is being careful,” he said.
Vance’s comments came ahead of his meeting with Omani Foreign Minister Badr Al Busaidi and other U.S. officials Friday in Washington to discuss Iran, a source familiar with the meeting confirmed to ABC News.
The scheduled meeting follows Thursday’s gathering in Geneva between special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, with Al Busaidi for indirect talks between Iran and the United States.
