Trump-Venezuela live updates: President reveals new details about US strikes after Maduro captured and charged

President Donald Trump was due to speak at 11 a.m. ET/ 4 p.m. GMT.

He is running more than 30 minutes behind schedule.

We’ll bring you the updates as soon as the press conference begins, which you can follow along on our live feed.

Donald Trump has shared a new photo purporting to be Nicolas Maduro en route to New York aboard the USS Iwo Jima.

The president posted the picture on Truth Social.

Maduro appeared to be wearing a flotation device around his neck.

Next to him was someone wearing a jacket that had a DEA logo.

Maduro also had protective headphones on his ears and appeared to be lifting a water bottle with both arms to drink.

President Donald Trump is about to address the nation from Mar-a-Lago.

We’ll bring you all the latest from his press conference.

A 25-page document from federal prosecutors in New York City claims Maduro and Venezuelan officials have “abused their positions of public trust and corrupted once-legitimate institutions to import tons of cocaine into the United States.”

Alex Woodward has the details.

Rep. Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, has called on the Trump administration to immediately brief Congress on its plan for preventing Venezuela from “descending into chaos.”

“Maduro is an illegitimate ruler, but I have seen no evidence that his presidency poses a threat that would justify military action without Congressional authorization, nor have I heard a strategy for the day after and how we will prevent Venezuela from descending into chaos,” Himes said in a statement.

“Secretary Rubio repeatedly denied to Congress that the Administration intended to force regime change in Venezuela. The Administration must immediately brief Congress on its plan to ensure stability in the region and its legal justification for this decision.”

American Chinook aircraft and Apache gunship escorts clattered through the night sky over Caracas, which was splashed orange with explosions as missiles attacked military sites across the country, writes The Independent’s world affairs editor Sam Kiley.

A few hours later, Donald Trump announced that Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife had been “captured” and flown out of their country.

High fives, no doubt, in the Oval Office – and more praise poems for Trump from his henchpeople, like Peter Hegseth, the secretary for defence/war, who puts more effort into public pull-ups than he does operational security, let alone strategic thought.

The United Nations has condemned the latest U.S. military escalation against Venezuela as a “dangerous precedent.”

In a statement, the U.N. said it was “deeply alarmed” by the U.S. strikes and capture of President Nicolas Maduro.

“These developments constitute a dangerous precedent,” Stéphane Dujarric, spokesman for the U.N. secretary-general, said in a statement.

Dujarric said the U.N. worried about the larger implications for Latin America and the Caribbean and called on “all actors in Venezuela” to respect human rights and the rule of law.

A superseding indictment just unsealed in New York federal court claims Nicolas Maduro has been at the “forefront of that corruption and has partnered with his co-conspirators to use his illegally obtained authority and the institutions he corroded to transport thousands of tons of cocaine to the United States.”

The Department of Justice alleges that Maduro and his wife enriched themselves with a “cycle of narcotics-based corruption” that “lines the pockets of Venezuelan officials and their families while also benefiting violent narco-terrorists who operate with impunity on Venezuelan soil and who help produce, protect, and transport tons of cocaine to the United States,” according to the document.

President Donald Trump has revealed that the capture of Nicolas Maduro was originally due to take place four days ago, but it was delayed due to poor weather conditions.

Watch the clip from Fox News below.

President Donald Trump refused to say whether he consulted Congress before carrying out airstrikes on the South American country during a phone call with The New York Times Saturday morning.

When asked by the Times whether he sought congressional approval before carrying out the “large scale” attack on Venezuela, he said, “We’ll discuss that, we’re going to have a news conference,” before hanging up the phone. The entire call lasted 50 seconds, theTimes reports.

Trump has repeatedly said he would not necessarily seek permission from Congress to launch a land war in Venezuela, saying instead that military assets are “just going to kill people” there instead.

“I don’t think we’re going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war. I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country, OK? We’re going to kill them,” Trump said during a White House roundtable with administration officials in October.

Also in October, the president said he “authorized” CIA operations inside Venezuela, granting intelligence operatives to take “covert action” against Maduro and his government, including as part of a wider military operation.

In remarks to reporters, Trump said he “authorized” CIA operations because Venezuela “emptied their prisons into the United States of America” and flooded the country with drugs.