{"id":8890,"date":"2026-01-04T18:13:48","date_gmt":"2026-01-04T18:13:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/2026\/01\/04\/trump-threatens-venezuelas-new-leader-with-a-fate-worse-than-maduros-the-atlantic\/"},"modified":"2026-01-04T18:13:48","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T18:13:48","slug":"trump-threatens-venezuelas-new-leader-with-a-fate-worse-than-maduros-the-atlantic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/2026\/01\/04\/trump-threatens-venezuelas-new-leader-with-a-fate-worse-than-maduros-the-atlantic\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Threatens Venezuela\u2019s New Leader With a Fate Worse Than Maduro\u2019s – The Atlantic"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The president told The Atlantic <\/em>that Delcy Rodr\u00edguez needs to comply with U.S. wishes\u2014or else.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Brendan Smialowski \/ AFP \/ Getty; Federico Parra \/ AFP \/ Getty.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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In a telephone interview<\/span> this morning, President Donald Trump issued a not-so-veiled threat against the new Venezuelan leader, Delcy Rodr\u00edguez, saying that \u201cif she doesn\u2019t do what\u2019s right, she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro,\u201d referring to Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, now residing in a New York City jail cell. Trump made clear that he would not stand for what he described as Rodr\u00edguez\u2019s defiant rejection of the armed U.S. intervention that resulted in Maduro\u2019s capture.<\/p>\n

During our call, Trump, who had just arrived at his golf club in West Palm Beach, was in evident good spirits, and reaffirmed to me that Venezuela may not be the last country subject to American intervention. \u201cWe do need Greenland, absolutely,\u201d he said, describing the island\u2014a part of Denmark, a NATO ally\u2014as \u201csurrounded by Russian and Chinese ships.\u201d And in discussing Venezuela\u2019s future, he signaled a clear shift away from his previous distaste for regime change and nation building, rejecting the concerns of many in his MAGA base. \u201cYou know, rebuilding there and regime change, anything you want to call it, is better than what you have right now. Can\u2019t get any worse,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The severe tone he took with Rodr\u00edguez contrasted with the praise he had offered her yesterday, hours after U.S.-military forces attacked Caracas and captured Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, for criminal prosecution. Trump said in a news conference after the attack that Rodr\u00edguez had privately indicated a willingness to work with the United States, which Trump declared would temporarily \u201crun\u201d her country.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s essentially willing to do what we think is necessary to make Venezuela great again,\u201d he said yesterday.<\/p>\n

Rodr\u00edguez rejected that suggestion moments later, declaring that the country is \u201cready to defend our natural resources\u201d and that the nation\u2019s defense counsel remained prepared to carry out the policies of Maduro, whose return she demanded. \u201cWe shall never be a colony ever again,\u201d she said. The prospect of Maduro\u2019s government continuing to resist the U.S. raised the risk of a protracted fight for control of Venezuela that would require increased U.S.-military involvement and even occupation. Trump yesterday signaled his willingness to order a second wave of military actions in Venezuela, should he deem it necessary.<\/p>\n

\u201cRebuilding is not a bad thing in Venezuela\u2019s case,\u201d he said. \u201cThe country\u2019s gone to hell. It\u2019s a failed country. It\u2019s a totally failed country. It\u2019s a country that\u2019s a disaster in every way.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a speech in December 2016, Trump declared as president-elect that the U.S. will \u201cstop racing to topple foreign regimes that we know nothing about.\u201d He had campaigned that year in opposition to \u201cnation building,\u201d arguing that the country needs to focus on rebuilding at home instead of in nations such as Iraq and Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

When I asked this morning why nation building and regime change in Venezuela would be different from similar efforts he previously opposed in Iraq, Trump suggested posing the question to former President George W. Bush.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t do Iraq. That was Bush. You\u2019ll have to ask Bush that question, because we should have never gone into Iraq. That started the Middle East disaster,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n

Trump has said he believes that the United States needs to maintain control over the Western Hemisphere, invoking his own version of the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine, which rejected European colonialism in the hemisphere. He calls his approach the \u201cDonroe Doctrine.\u201d But in the interview, he said that the decision to kidnap the Venezuelan president was not made simply because of geography.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not hemisphere. It\u2019s the country. It\u2019s individual countries,\u201d he said in the phone call.<\/p>\n

I asked him whether the attack on Venezuela could indicate a willingness to take military action to seize control of Greenland, an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, which has rejected American territorial claims. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said yesterday that the world should take notice after the Venezuela operation. \u201c\u200b\u200bWhen he tells you that he\u2019s going to do something, when he tells you he\u2019s going to address a problem, he means it,\u201d Rubio said. Trump has repeatedly said that the U.S. \u201cneeds\u201d to control Greenland.<\/p>\n

Trump said it was up to others to decide what U.S.-military action in Venezuela means for Greenland. \u201cThey are going to have to view it themselves. I really don\u2019t know. He was very generous to me, Marco, yesterday,\u201d Trump said. \u201cYou know, I wasn\u2019t referring to Greenland at that time. But we do need Greenland, absolutely. We need it for defense.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The president told The Atlantic that Delcy Rodr\u00edguez needs to comply with U.S. wishes\u2014or else. Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Brendan Smialowski \/ AFP \/ Getty; Federico Parra \/ AFP \/ Getty. January 4, 2026, 12:01 PM ET In a telephone interview this morning, President Donald Trump issued a not-so-veiled threat against the new Venezuelan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8891,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}