Dem outrage ERUPTS after Trump strikes Venezuela

I want to bring in Hugh Hewitt, former assistant White House counsel and Fox News contributor, Hugh. Good morning to you. A stunning operation overnight. You were former White House counsel. And as I suspected, we were likely going to see this morning, Democrats are coming out

and challenging the legality of this operation. We already have Congressman Jim McGovern saying that this was unjustified that was carried out and that it was not authority said without authorization from Congress and with the vast majority of Americans opposed to military action. Trump just launched an unjustified illegal strike on Venezuela. I suspect we'll hear other Democrat voices challenging it

as well. What do you make of it? Well, good morning. And, uh, Jim McGovern is an old friend of mine. He's an old Massachusetts liberal my age. He'd been wrong for as long as I've been right. And in fact, this is well within president Trump's article two authority. It is a replay of the 1989 operation just cause that George H.W. Bush launched to capture and spirit Noriega out of Panama. He was also a narco-cartelist tyrant, and he ended up spending the rest of his days in jail.

Here's the deal. The president can do this. It's very impressive. It certainly follows through, as Donald Trump does, on a threat, as he did with Iran last summer. He said, I'm going to act if you don't stop building nukes.

He told Maduro, I'm going to come and get you if you don't stop tyrannizing your country. As Ms. Machado said on tape, Juan Guaido said four years ago, Maduro has been a ruthless tyrant dictator for, well, since he took over for Hugo Chavez, who was himself a dictator. This is great news for the 30 million people of Venezuela. I am mostly concerned for the 20,000-plus Americans who are in Venezuela right now, because it's still a police state.

There's still a Cuban security service-backed police operation there. And hopefully the people of Venezuela Venezuela who have risen up time and time again against the dictators Maduro and Chavez, I'll rise up today in the streets like the people in Iran are doing and bravo to President Trump it's well within his presidential powers so our friends on the left who have been wrong about international operations for since Reagan invaded Granada this is

good news for everyone who loves freedom and especially for the Venezuelan people.

Obviously, President Trump is not looking at getting involved in some long protracted military operation. His supporters are not interested in that. But as Griff points out, you already are going to start seeing Democrats and there are others who are carping about this. How do you see the domestic, how do you see the politics of this playing out domestically

here in the United States?

Well, I would hope that every Republican, I know Mike Lee's got his question, but I read the tweets this morning of Deputy Secretary of State Chris Landau. We'll hear at the press conference that President Trump will hold a little bit later that he's very confident of his legal authorities. I'm sure he had the opinion of the White House Council, the Department of Justice, the Office of Legal Counsel, saying it's well within your Article II authority.

We have had that flotilla, this extraordinary armada in the Caribbean for weeks and months. And so if a few people try and score points off of Donald Trump for a successful extrication of a narco criminal who's a tyrant, let them try and let the American people see that the Republican Party and its

friends stand for freedom and for closing America's borders to the drug trade and for making sure that people are safe and secure in Venezuela and for democracy around the world because as the former president or the rightfully elected president of Venezuela, Ms. Machado, said, this is about democracy. It's not about tyranny. This isn't about toppling regimes.

It was very surgical. Donald Trump did it again. And boy, it drives Democrats crazy when he pulls off successes like this. But the American military is not to be trifled with. My hat is off to everyone involved in what is obviously a very complicated and long, well-planned strategy executed by Secretary Hegseth.

And whoever is running Southern Command, I don't know the name of that admiral.

Biden treated Maduro more like a nuisance than anything other than that by easing up on the sanctions, reopening the oil, and he even offered legitimacy by meeting with him. Under Biden, Maduro then tightened his grip on power, got money, leverage, and time. And that weakness emboldened Maduro

and all of that he stood for. So, President Trump has now come in because showing that strength deters and weakness, again, emboldens this dictatorship. but I think moving forward right now this military operation was precise it was effective it was clearly a success but I think the American people who are watching this right now messaging is going to matter because if

you look at the history of the US overthrowing historical leaders you have in Granada Panama but also what happened in Iraq. And I think Americans are concerned that, yes, the military strikes are effective, but what happens after that? What happens next?

How involved will the U.S. be? Will this be a protracted involvement in Venezuela?

I don't think so. And I think people are right to make that question, put it right on the table. Are we going to have another 20-year-long war? The answer is no. There's no big, massive invasion. There is a surgical strike.

There's a series, I think, of four strikes, as I read this morning, two I imagine diverted tensions, surface Maduro, special operators sweep in and get him. And if they continue, if they threaten any Americans, they're out of their mind if they threaten any of the Americans in Venezuela right now, but I would not put it past the thugs who remain who may want to try and cling to power. The people in charge of Venezuela right now, the remaining regime elements of the Maduro regime, they have a clear choice.

They can step back from power, maybe do a deal with the United States to get a get-out-of-jail-free card and let the people of Venezuela be free. They have voted time and time again to be free. So this is not regime change. It's not building democracy. Venezuela's got a lot of experience with voting.

It's just that their votes never counted before. And it's a wonderfully wealthy country. It ought to be the wealthiest country in South America It's very impoverished. It's people have had to flee for a decade. They flooded Colombia destabilized, Colombia They've come up through the United States as the president will no doubt say at 11 o'clock Majuro sent all of his criminals to the United States when the Joe Biden open border policy was in effect. Now I hope Ms. Machado is right, that good, wonderful people of Venezuela who

came to the United States out of fear for their lives, want to go home and help rebuild the country that Maduro and Chavez before him systematically destroyed over two decades.

That would be the best result, but it's not regime change. It's not democracy building. This is a developed nation. Not regime change. And so we're already seeing also some statements out there, Hugh, from members of the Senate Armed Services Committee and the minority saying that they were not notified. And you saw in statements from the White House already this morning that this operation was carried out, quote, in conjunction with U.S. law enforcement. Do you anticipate that the president at 11 o'clock in this press conference will clarify that this follows more of a law enforcement lane than a military regime change operation?

Well, I hope he has both secretary Hicks, Seth and attorney general Bondi with him. Griff, I think it's very important that the legal basis for this intervention is presented and it's very clear why it exists. They're, they pose a real threat to Americans, uh, via the narco terrorism and Pete Hicks can stand up there and explain whatever we want to reveal. But I don't expect the president to say, this is the end. He is not, he does not telegraph what he's going to do.

He's told me, he's told you many, many times that, look, I'm not in the business of telling our enemies what I'm going to do. But for the moment, I think operations have ended. Maduro's on his way to some jail, probably in Miami, which is close. And then the president will turn it over to Bondi or Hegseth to explain. And I think and Secretary

Rubio, no doubt, will be there as well. But it's going to be a pretty triumphant press conference because the president deserves applause this morning.

All right. Hugh Hewitt, thank you so much for your insights. Thanks Hugh. Thanks Hugh.

Always good to be here.