Trump’s bet on regime change in Venezuela is a sharp departure from MAGA agenda

Reuters

President Donald Trump’s decision to attack Venezuela, arrest its president and temporarily run the country marks a striking departure for a politician who long criticized others for overreaching on foreign affairs and vowed to avoid foreign entanglements.

His vision for US involvement in Venezuela, sketched out in a midday news conference, left open the possibility of more military action, ongoing involvement in that nation’s politics and oil industry and “boots on the ground.”

The term suggests military deployment of the sort that presidents often avoid for fear of provoking domestic political backlash.

Grenada, claiming that the government at that time was illegitimate, a claim Trump has also made with respect to Maduro.

In 1989, former President George H.W. Bush invaded Panama to depose dictator Manuel Noriega who, like Maduro, was wanted on US drug-trafficking charges. In that case, the US installed Noriega’s replacement.

Elliott Abrams, who served as Venezuela envoy in Trump’s first term, said he did not believe the president was running a political risk at home in ousting Maduro and that he “has a lot of latitude as long as American troops are not dying.” But he acknowledged: “I don’t know what running Venezuela means.”

“He’s done the right thing in removing Maduro,” said Abrams, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations think-tank. “The question is whether he will do the right thing in supporting democracy in Venezuela.”

Brett Bruen, a former foreign policy adviser in Barack Obama’s administration, said the US could now be sucked into overseeing a complex transition process.

“I don’t see any short version of this story,” said Bruen, now head of the Global Situation Room, an international affairs consultancy. “The US will get tangled up in Venezuela but will also have new problems to contend with related to its neighbors.”

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