“The ongoing military actions in the Caribbean and South America, including the kidnapping of the Venezuelan president, are wrong and illegal under US and international law, and unconstitutional,” said Robert Weissman, co-chair of Public Citizen. He said Before the Senate hearing. “Republicans in Congress have blocked war powers resolutions that would end U.S. aggression in Venezuela, a very dangerous abdication of Congress’ responsibility to check the president’s illegitimacy.”
“Marco Rubio’s central role in planning and executing the scheme to violate Venezuela’s sovereignty and steal the country’s oil deserves a deep investigation by Congress, and possibly the removal of Rubio as Secretary of State,” Weissman continued. “Rubio’s dangerous expansionist vision of turning the United States into a colonial power in the Americas must be challenged.”
In testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee — where he previously served — Rubio said that “Maduro is an accused drug trafficker, not a lawful head of state,” described his kidnapping as a “law enforcement assistance operation,” and declared that “the United States is prepared to help oversee Venezuela’s transition from a criminal state to a responsible partner.”
Rubio, the acting national security adviser, insisted that Trump was not planning any further military action in Venezuela, but was also planning… It will not be ruled out Such action, perhaps without authorization from Congress, is in “self-defense” against an “imminent” threat.
Trump has repeatedly made clear through his public statements that his policy toward Venezuela is focused on its oil reserves, apparently to enrich the fossil fuel leaders who helped him return to power. US forces have seized several tankers in the Caribbean linked to the country — which critics have condemned as “piracy” — and the first American sale of Venezuelan oil went to a trader who has donated millions to the president’s 2024 campaign, which Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) last week called “another example of his unbridled corruption.”
Describing U.S. control of Venezuela’s nationalized oil industry, Rubio He said Committee:
The first goal was stability… and one of the tools available to us is the fact of imposing sanctions on oil. There is sanctioned oil that cannot be transported from Venezuela due to our quarantine. And so what we did is we entered into an arrangement with them, and the arrangement is as follows: For oil that is subject to sanctions and quarantine, we will allow you to take it to market. We will allow you to take it to market at market prices, not at the discount that China was getting. In return, the resulting funds will be deposited in an account that we will have control over, and you will spend this money for the benefit of the Venezuelan people…
This will not be a permanent mechanism, but a short-term mechanism through which the needs of the Venezuelan people can be met through a process that we have created, where every month they will submit a budget with that amount that we need to fund. We’ll provide them on the front end what that money can’t be used for. They have been very cooperative in this regard. In fact, they have pledged to use a significant amount of this money to purchase medicines and equipment directly from the United States.
In an interview with Senate Foreign Relations Committee member Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), Rubio said the “audit process” had not been set up yet but would be set up, adding, “We only made one payment” and “it will be audited retroactively, but it is important that we make that payment because they had to pay salaries. They had to keep sanitation workers, police officers, and government workers on staff.”
Sahin noted that oil was sold for $500 million, but only $300 million went to the Venezuelan government, now led by Maduro’s former deputy, Delcy Rodriguez, and asked Rubio about the remaining $200 million. The secretary said the rest of the money was in a temporary account in Qatar which would eventually become an account Blocked US Treasury account.
Summarizing the Trump administration’s plans, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) He said“I think the scope of the project you are implementing in Venezuela is unprecedented. You are taking their oil at gunpoint, you are holding it and selling it, you are putting the receipts for the time being in an offshore account in the Middle East, and you are deciding how and for what purposes this money will be used in a country of 30 million people. And I think many of us think that this is doomed to failure.”
Murphy added: “A month later, we have no information on a timetable for the democratic transition, the Maduro people are still in power, most of the political prisoners are in prison – and by the way, the ones who have been released have a gag order on them from the government – the opposition leader is still in exile, and this already looks like a failure.”
At one point during the nearly three-hour hearing, Leonardo Flores, a Venezuelan-American from the anti-war group CodePink, shouted: “Marco Rubio, you and Trump are thugs!”
US Capitol Police removed Flores from the hearing. As he was led away, the protester said, “Sanctions are a form of collective punishment of Venezuelan citizens. It is a war crime. Hands off Venezuela! Hands off Cuba!”
When asked by Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) on Wednesday: “Will you make a public commitment today to rule out U.S. regime change in Cuba,” Rubio — the son of Cuban immigrants — responded.He replied: “Regime change? Oh no, I think we would like to see the regime there changed. That doesn’t mean we would make a change, but we would like to see a change. There is no doubt about the fact that it would be beneficial for the United States if Cuba was no longer ruled by an authoritarian regime.”
Since the kidnapping, “Free Maduro” protests have erupted in both Venezuela and Cuba, which lost 32 citizens in the Trump administration’s attack on Caracas. Speaking to thousands of people gathered outside the US Embassy in Havana earlier this month, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said that “the current US administration has opened the door to an era of barbarism, plunder and neo-fascism.”
“No one here is giving up,” he continued, targeting not only Trump but Rubio as well. “The current emperor of the White House and his notorious Secretary of State have not stopped threatening me.”
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