United Nations Ambassador Mike Waltz appeared before the United Nations Security Council after the capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, stressing that the United States is not at war with the country, that the Trump Administration's actions were lawful, and that Maduro's fraudulent reelection in 2024 was already declared illegitimate.
Waltz repeated State Secretary Marco Rubio's words that "there is no war against Venezuela or its people. We are not occupying a country. This was a law enforcement operation in furtherance of lawful indictments that have existed for decades."
Additionally, he compared Maduro's capture to that of former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega in 1989, pointing out that "the Panamanian people, the American people, are safer for it, and undeniably, the region was more stable."
Moreover, Waltz pointed out that "this law enforcement action was directed consistent with the President of the United States' responsibility as commander-in-chief to protect Americans at home and abroad against a fugitive who is directly responsible for narco-terrorism that has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans and created destabilizing violence throughout our hemisphere."
Ambassador Waltz called out anyone within the UN who questioned the arrest, reminding them that "just two years ago in 2024, a UN panel of experts' report found that the election [Venezuela] that year was absolutely and completely a farce and fell well short of the most basic transparency integrity measures essential to upholding credible elections."
"If the UN, in this body, confers legitimacy on an illegitimate narco-terrorist and the same treatment in this charter of a democratically elected president or head of state, what kind of organization is this?" Waltz questioned, further reminding the Council that over 50 countries, including most of Latin America and the European Union, refused to recognize Maduro as the legitimate leader of Venezuela after the election.
Waltz quoted Secretary Rubio a final time, saying, "This is the Western Hemisphere. This is where we live, and we are not going to allow the Western Hemisphere to be used as a base of operations for our nation's adversaries and competitors and rivals of the United States."
