Major Flex: Richard Grenell Flying to Venezuela to Explain to Maduro What the New Rules Are
Venezuelan strongman/dictator Nicolás Maduro has been insistent that Venezuela won't accept the delivery of his own people, specifically, Tren de Aragua gang members and other criminals who are in the United States illegally. The Biden administration meekly accepted this, just as they meekly accepted millions of who-knows people across the borders. But things have changed; President Trump, on Friday, sent former Ambassador Ric Grenell to Venezuela to give El Presidente Maduro what my grandmother would have described as a "right good talking to." Fox News' Bill Melugin put out the word on X:
Bill Melugin's X post reads in full:
NEW: Per Senior Trump admin official, in a trip coordinated by the White House & State Department, @RichardGrenell is en route to Venezuela to meet with the Maduro regime in an effort to reach an agreement that would see VZ accept US deportations of Tren de Aragua gang members.
That doesn't sound, on the surface, like all that much of a much. Maduro isn't likely to be conducive to diplomatic discussions. But, moments later, Bill Melugin gives us the update: Mr. Grenell isn't going down there to negotiate.
The full post:
NEW: A second senior Trump admin official tells me this is not a negotiation or the spawning of a new relationship with Venezuela. Maduro will be told he will take his gang members back, that the US is telling him, not asking him, and that there is no US ambassador to VZ for a reason. Will also discuss the potential return of some Americans in VZ prisons. I'm told this will be a very quick trip.
This, folks, is how the game should be played. This is an America-scaled flex; an exercise in decisive and muscular foreign policy. I have no idea how El Presidente Maduro will react to being told what the new rules are but told he will be, and after that, it's up to him to decide to defy the only global superpower in the Americas — and President Trump, who is a much different character than his predecessor. What was his name again? Oh, that's right. Joe Biden. The guy sure didn't make much of an impression.
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This is how you handle a despot like Maduro. Send a key person down there. Tell him, in no uncertain terms, that the rules have changed, and he better accept it. Then we start putting his people on one-way flights to Caracas, with a U.S. Marshall on board to make sure they get off — and stay off. Then they are, as they rightly should be, Venezuela's problem.
America is back, baby.
Donald Trump sent former diplomat Richard Grenell, who served as the Acting Director of National Intelligence for a stint under the president’s first term, down to Venezuela to—as our Ward Clark put it—“explain to [strongman/dictator Nicolás] Maduro what the new rules are.”
It didn’t take long for Grenell to bring home results—in fact, after meeting with Maduro, Ric returned to the United States with six freed hostages:
The president took to social media to congratulate Grenell, who he named Presidential Envoy for Special Missions in December:
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The visit showcased a sharply different tone than we've seen in Venezuela’s recent, more tense interactions with the American government:
Grenell’s trip was believed to be the first direct meeting between a U.S. official and the autocrat since 2022.
Venezuela’s state-owned broadcaster showed Grenell shaking hands with a smiling Maduro in the Miraflores presidential palace, a striking image to capture the Trump administration’s first visit to Latin America. Later Friday, Grenell tweeted that he was returning to the United States with the six Americans.
Grenell, a former acting director of national intelligence, and Maduro, the authoritarian socialist who has ruled Venezuela since 2013, met to discuss the Americans detained in the South American country, as well as deportation flights, cooperation to confront the Tren de Aragua gang and energy, according to one person familiar with the plan, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.
Leading up to the trip, the White House made it clear that Grenell wasn’t headed down there to play around:
"I would urge the Maduro government, the Maduro regime in Venezuela, to heed special envoy Ric Grenell's message," said [Trump's special envoy to Latin America, Mauricio] Claver-Carone, a former top national security aide to Trump during his first administration. "Ultimately there will be consequences otherwise."
Sounds like, for now at least, Maduro got the message.
It’s almost hard to get used to so much activity and so many decisions—and let’s be honest, so much winning—after four long years of the Biden malaise. It almost takes some mental adjustment to acclimate to seeing a president answering questions, taking decisive action, and making positive things happen. It's an adjustment I'm more than happy to make.
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This tweet does a pretty good job of summing up just today, Friday:
...and then he rescued 6 hostages from Venezuela and then he flew to Florida to spend the weekend with his supermodel wife. What a boss.
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