Overview
- Speaking to reporters Monday in Florida, the president described a major explosion at a shore-side area where boats are loaded with drugs and declined to say whether the military or the CIA carried out the operation.
- U.S. officials privately indicated he was referring to a drug facility in Venezuela but provided no operational specifics, including location, method, damage assessment or casualties.
- Local reports and videos from Dec. 24 pointed to an explosion near Maracaibo, and a firm named Primazol reported a warehouse fire there, though none of the material has been independently verified.
- If corroborated, it would be the first known land strike after at least 29 U.S. attacks on suspected drug boats since September that have killed more than 100 people and followed a broader oil blockade and tanker seizures.
- Legal and human rights experts continue to label the boat strikes extrajudicial and question the authority for any land or covert actions, even as Trump has acknowledged authorizing CIA operations in Venezuela.