Trump says US role in Venezuela could last for years | News on tensions between the United States and Venezuela

Venezuela’s interior minister said the U.S. operation to remove Maduro killed 100 people and injured dozens.

United States President Donald Trump said “only time will tell” how long his country holds out in Venezuela following the president’s recent kidnapping. Nicolas Maduro by American special forces, as stated by the Venezuelan Minister of the Interior, 100 people were killed during the operation.

In an interview with The New York Times published Thursday, the president stopped short of giving a specific timetable for his country’s direct surveillance of the South American nation, but indicated it would likely last “much longer” than a year when asked for a response.

From Maduro forced removal The United States repeatedly asserted its dominance over Venezuela on Saturday, saying it would control the country’s oil sales.indefinitely» despite claims by interim leader Delcy Rodriguez that no foreign power governs Caracas.

Trump said the United States “gets along very well” with Rodriguez’s administration, adding that Secretary of State Marco Rubio “talks to him all the time,” according to the newspaper. He had previously threatened her with a fate worse than Maduro’s if she did not obey.

He did not indicate why he recognized Rodriguez as leader rather than opposition leader. Maria Corina Machadowho successfully led an electoral campaign against Maduro in 2024, and refused to commit to holding new elections.

“We will rebuild it [Venezuela] in a very cost-effective way,” he said. “We’re going to use oil, and we’re going to take oil. We are bringing down oil prices and we are going to give money to Venezuela, which it desperately needs.”

100 dead in American raid

US troops kidnapped Maduro and his wife on Saturday in a dramatic attack involving 150 planes taking off from 20 air bases, taking them to New York to stand trial for drug and arms trafficking.

Minister of the Interior Diosdado Hair said Wednesday that the raid left 100 people dead and dozens more injured, adding that Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores were injured in the “terrible” attack but were “recovering.”

Caracas had not yet published a death toll, but the army had published a list of 23 names of its dead and Cuba had announced that 32 members of its military and intelligence services in the country had been killed.

Venezuelan officials said much of Maduro’s security contingent was killed “in cold blood.”

Rodriguez, whom Cabello praised on his weekly show on state television as “courageous,” declared a week of mourning starting Tuesday for the soldiers killed in the raid.