‘Full Wrath Of American Justice’: Trump Admin Announces Indictment of Venezuelan Socialist Dictator Nicolás Maduro

Captured Venezuelan socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife have been indicted on charges including narco-terrorism conspiracy, the Department of Justice (DOJ) stated Saturday morning.

In the indictment released Saturday morning, a grand jury found that Maduro and his late predecessor, Hugo Chávez, “abused their positions of public trust and corrupted once-legitimate institutions to import tons of cocaine into the United States.” The scathing indictment alleged that Maduro “now sits atop a corrupt, illegitimate government that, for decades, has leveraged government power to protect and promote” drug trafficking operations that “enriched and entrenched Venezuela’s political and military elite” and “concentrated power and wealth in the hands of” his wife and family.

President Donald Trump, in the early morning hours of the first weekend of 2026, announced on Truth Social that U.S. forces had “successfully carried out a large scale strike” against Venezuela. The operation culminated in the capture of Maduro and his wife, both of whom Trump noted had been removed from the country via plane. Three hours later, Trump’s attorney general, Pam Bondi, wrote on X that the Maduros had been indicted on four separate charges and will face trial in the U.S. court system.

“Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, have been indicted in the Southern District of New York. Nicolas Maduro has been charged with Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States,” Bondi wrote. “They will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts.”