Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that additional Venezuelan narco traffickers would ‘face the same fate’ as the 11 Tren de Aragua members who were killed Tuesday in a U.S. military strike.
Hegseth appeared on Fox & Friends on Wednesday morning to issue the threat.
‘We’ve got assets in the air, assets in the water, assets on ships, because this is a deadly serious mission for us, and it won’t stop with just this strike,’ Hegseth said.
‘Anyone else trafficking in those waters who we know is a designated Narco terrorist will face the same fate,’ he added.
President Donald Trump announced the U.S. strike on Tuesday from the Oval Office.
During his Wednesday meeting with the Polish president, he was asked why he decided to use deadly force against the traffickers.
‘On the boat you had massive amounts of drugs, we have tapes of them speaking, it was massive amounts of drugs coming into our country to kill a lot of people,’ Trump replied, adding that ‘you see the bags of drugs all over the boat.’
‘And they were hit, obviously, they won’t be doing it again and I think a lot of other people won’t be doing it again once they see that tape,’ the president said.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appeared on Fox & Friends Wednesday morning and said more Venezuelan narco traffickers would ‘face the same fate’ as the 11 who were killed in a U.S. strike in the south Caribbean on Tuesday
President Donald Trump was asked Wednesday why he decided to use lethal force against the drug traffickers instead of bringing the boat in
Trump posted video footage of the strike on Truth Social shortly after announcing it had been a success.
‘We knew exactly who was in that boat, we knew exactly what they were doing and we knew exactly who they represented,’ Hegseth said on Fox & Friends, adding that the traffickers were ‘trying to poison our country with illicit drugs.’
‘It’s a new day, it’s a different day,’ Hegseth also said.
Venezuela’s dictator Nicolas Maduro has been fuming over the U.S.’s increased military presence in the region.
Maduro, whom the U.S. does not recognize as the legitimate president of the country after an election last year, threatened to ‘declare a republic in arms’ if attacked by American forces.
‘In the face of this maximum military pressure, we have declared maximum preparedness for the defense of Venezuela,’ Maduro also said.
The Pentagon has deployed at least seven warships to the southern Caribbean.
Maduro characterized the escalation as ‘an extravagant, unjustifiable, immoral and absolutely criminal and bloody threat.’
The USS Sampson was docked near the entrance of the Panama Canal over the weekend amid a large buildup of U.S. naval forces in the southern Caribbean
Last month, Attorney General Pam Bondi announced a $50million reward for information leading to the arrest of Maduro, saying he uses ‘foreign terrorist organizations’ to ‘bring deadly drugs and violence into our country.’
In the announcement, she said the Drug Enforcement Administration seized 30 tons of cocaine linked to Maduro and his associates and 7 tons of cocaine linked to the Venezuelan dictator personally.
She noted that cocaine is often laced with fentanyl, which has led to droves of American deaths.
‘Under President Trump’s leadership, Maduro will not escape justice and he will be held accountable for his despicable crimes,’ Bondi said.
Caracas has long denied Maduro’s ties to the drug cartels.
Trump campaigned on eradicating the drug trade.
Since taking office, the president has also surged resources to the southern border and threatened China with tariffs over fentanyl trafficking.
Last year, Maduro claimed victory in Venezuela’s presidential election over opponent Edmundo González in an election that international monitors said was neither free nor fair.
During his news conference on Monday, Maduro also continued to claim that he was the legitimate winner of the 2024 election.
