Donald Trump will hold a meeting in the Oval Office with his top team on Monday to discuss the ‘next steps’ for Venezuela, according to sources.
The president has summoned senior national security officials including Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and her deputy Stephen Miller are also expected to attend the meeting scheduled for 5pm, according to CNN.
Trump increased pressure on Venezuela’s socialist tyrant Nicolas Maduro over the weekend, reportedly giving him an ultimatum to step down.
‘I wouldn’t say it went well or badly, it was a phone call,’ the president told reporters on Sunday.
Neither the US nor the Venezuelan government has given details of the call which is understood to have taken place on November 21.
But sources told the Miami Herald that Trump bluntly told Maduro that his time was up following a four-month campaign by US military against ‘narco terrorists’ in the Caribbean.
‘You can save yourself and those closest to you, but you must leave the country now,’ Trump reportedly told Maduro, offering him safe passage for his wife and son ‘only if he agreed to resign right away’.
Trump has assembled the largest US force in the Caribbean since the Cold War and it grows more menacing by the day – with now at least 11 warships and 15,000 men deployed.
The president backed Hegseth Sunday after lawmakers from across the aisle complained about a report the Secretary of War ordered a follow-up air strike to kill survivors following a strike on a drug smuggling boat on September 2.
Trump denied the Washington Post report, saying: ‘He said he did not say that.’
Lawmakers said they didn’t know if the paper’s report was true, and some GOP officials were skeptical, but they said attacking survivors of an initial missile strike poses serious legal concerns.
‘The order was to kill everybody,’ two sources told the Post.
Trump said that he would ‘look into’ the matter and added, ‘I wouldn’t have wanted that – not a second strike.’
Both Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill had agreed Sunday that if it was true, Hegseth was in deep trouble.
‘This rises to the level of a war crime if it’s true,’ said Democrat Tim Kaine of Virginia.
‘Obviously, if that occurred, that would be very serious and I agree that that would be an illegal act,’ said Ohio Republican Mike Turner.
After the Post’s report, Hegseth said Friday on X that ‘fake news is delivering more fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting to discredit our incredible warriors fighting to protect the homeland.’
‘Our current operations in the Caribbean are lawful under both U.S. and international law, with all actions in compliance with the law of armed conflict — and approved by the best military and civilian lawyers, up and down the chain of command,’ Hegseth wrote.
Meanwhile, the US is piling the pressure on Venezuela, with a major military buildup in the Caribbean, the designation of an alleged drug cartel run by Maduro as a terrorist group, and an ominous warning from Trump that Venezuelan airspace is ‘closed.’
Washington says the aim of the military deployment launched in September is to curb drug trafficking in the region, but Caracas insists regime change is the ultimate goal.
The New York Times reported Friday that Trump and Maduro had discussed a possible meeting, while The Wall Street Journal said Saturday that the conversation also included conditions of amnesty if Maduro were to step down.
Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin said Sunday on CNN’s ‘State of the Union’ talk show that the United States has offered Maduro the chance to leave his country for Russia or elsewhere.
Maduro, who has been in power since 2013, has followed in his predecessor, Hugo Chávez’s footsteps, by cultivating strong military loyalty by appointing officers to high-ranking government roles.
The US has condemned Maduro’s corrupt rule, citing the president’s election victory in 2024, despite evidence that his opposition won more votes.
Rubio called Maduro an illegitimate president, recently naming the Cartel de Los Soles a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
Rubio stated that the Cartel de Los Soles is a group of high-ranking individuals following Maduro who have corrupted the country’s military, intelligence, legislature, and judiciary, including invoking terrorist violence and trafficking drugs.
Tensions have heightened in recent months between Venezuela and the US, as the Trump administration has launched a crusade to take down ‘narco-terrorists’ transporting drugs through international waters.
But Venezuela and countries that support it insist no such organization even exists.
Several Venezuela experts say what Washington calls the Cartel of the Suns refers to the corruption of senior officials by criminal gangs.
The United States also does not recognize Maduro as the legitimate winner of last year’s presidential election.
Though Trump has not publicly threatened to use force against Maduro, he said in recent days that efforts to halt Venezuelan drug trafficking ‘by land’ would begin ‘very soon.’
The president has also suggested that operations could escalate to land strikes, telling service members on a reported phone call on Thanksgiving of the military expansion.
‘In recent weeks, you’ve been working to deter Venezuelan drug traffickers, of which there are many. Of course, there aren’t too many coming in by sea anymore,’ he said.
Trump added that it was ‘easier’ to intercept potential drug traffickers on land, and that operations would begin ‘very soon.’
‘We warn them: Stop sending poison to our country,’ he added.
In the past week, Navy vessels have been seen sailing increasingly closer to the South American nation.
The new wave of deployments began in August with the arrival of the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group. In October, the US announced that the 1106ft USS Gerald R Ford, the largest aircraft carrier in the world, would also join the mission.
The carrier reached Caribbean waters on November 11 with more than four thousand sailors, fighter jets and support vessels, including the USS Thomas Hudner, USS Rampage, and USS Normandy.
Meanwhile, in Venezuela, Maduro has said eight million civilians are training in militias.
However, the military’s equipment is decades old, most of which was purchased from Russia in the early 2000s.
