Mike Waltz delivers remarks during an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council following U.S. strikes in Venezuela and the capture of Nicolás Maduro. (Screenshot/C-SPAN)
United States Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz tore into the U.N. Security Council Monday after the globalist establishment erupted in outraged denunciations over the decisive U.S. military operation that captured socialist tyrant Nicolás Maduro and brought him to New York to face federal narco-terrorism charges.
The emergency UN Security Council meeting was called after Maduro’s dramatic weekend capture by U.S. special forces.
The meeting was formally requested by Colombia, a non-permanent Council member for the 2026–2027 term, and aggressively backed by Russia and China, both of which rushed to defend the disgraced dictator and condemn the United States for allegedly violating “international law” and “state sovereignty.”
Standing firm on behalf of the Trump administration, Ambassador Waltz rebuked global elites for equating a ruthless drug kingpin and terrorist-backed dictator with legitimate heads of state.
In his forceful remarks, Waltz emphasized that the United States is not at war with Venezuela and has no intention of occupying the country.
Waltz compared the operation to the 1989 capture of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega.
Waltz reminded the Council that Maduro’s claim to power collapsed years ago and was exposed following the sham 2024 election.
A United Nations panel of experts itself concluded that the election was “absolutely and completely a farce,” lacking even the most basic standards of transparency and integrity.
More than 50 countries—including the United States, numerous Latin American nations, and members of the European Union—refused to recognize Maduro’s so-called re-election.
Waltz detailed Maduro’s role as the leader of the Cartel de los Soles, a regime-sponsored narco-terror organization coordinating with violent gangs such as Tren de Aragua—now designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
According to Waltz, thousands of Tren de Aragua operatives have unlawfully infiltrated the United States, carrying out murders, kidnappings, extortion, and human and weapons trafficking—amounting to irregular warfare against American communities.
In March 2025, President Trump formally declared that Tren de Aragua was conducting hostile actions against U.S. territory at the direction of the Maduro regime.
Perhaps the most damning moment of Waltz’s speech came when he turned the UN’s own reports against itself.
He cited the UN Office on Drugs and Crime’s 2025 World Drug Report, which identified Venezuela as a major trafficking hub for cocaine flooding into both the United States and Europe—directly contradicting the Council’s performative outrage.
Waltz also outlined Maduro’s alliances with Hizballah, corrupt Iranian officials, Cuban intelligence operatives, and other malign actors who transformed Venezuela into a forward operating base for America’s adversaries—all while sitting atop the world’s largest proven oil reserves.
Full transcript from Waltz’s speech:
“Mr. President, thank you for chairing. And I particularly want to thank you, Ms. De Freitas, for your briefing. And I’ll point out that Ms. De Freitas is in exile having fled the regime. Thank you for your courage and thank you for shedding a light on the true atrocities of the illegitimate Maduro regime.
This past weekend, colleagues, the United States successfully carried out a surgical law enforcement operation facilitated by the U.S. military against two indicted fugitives of American justice, narco-terrorist Nicolas Maduro and Cilia Flores. Colleagues, Nicolas Maduro is responsible for attacks on the people of the United States, for destabilizing the Western Hemisphere, and illegitimately repressing the people of Venezuela.
As Secretary Rubio has said, there is no war against Venezuela or its people. We are not occupying a country. This was a law enforcement operation in furtherance of lawful indictments that have existed for decades. The United States arrested a narcotrafficker who is now going to stand trial in the United States in accordance with the rule of law for the crimes he’s committed against our people for 15 years.
A similar action was taken in 1989 against Manuel Noriega. He was arrested, indicted, convicted in a court of law, served in prison in the United States and in Panama. And the Panamanian people, the American people, are safer for it. And undeniably, the region was more stable.
This law enforcement action was directed consistent with the President of the United States’ responsibility as Commander in Chief to protect Americans at home and abroad, against a fugitive who is directly responsible for narco-terrorism that has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans and created destabilizing violence throughout our hemisphere.
Nicolas Maduro and his co-defendant Cilia Flores have been transferred here to the United States to stand trial for their crimes. Maduro was indicted by a grand jury in the Southern District of New York and faces very serious criminal charges for his involvement in a wide-ranging conspiracy to conduct narcoterrorism, to traffic cocaine and other drugs, and conducting international weapons trafficking. The overwhelming evidence of his crimes will be presented openly in the U.S. court proceedings.
Colleagues, Maduro is not just an indicted drug trafficker; he was an illegitimate so-called president. He was not a head of state.
For years, Maduro and his cronies have manipulated Venezuela’s electoral system to maintain their illegitimate grip on power.
In fact, just two years ago in 2024, a UN panel of experts report found that the election in that year was absolutely and completely a farce and fell well short of the most basic transparency integrity measures essential to upholding credible elections.
If the UN and the United Nations and this body confers legitimacy on an illegitimate narco-terrorist and the same treatment in this charter of a democratically elected president or head of state, what kind of organization is this?
We should note that over 50 countries, many nations, including the European Union, including a number of Latin American countries in the region, and, of course, the United States – again over 50 countries rejected the legitimacy of Maduro’s re-election following the disputed 2024 elections, and do not – do not recognize him as Venezuela’s legitimately elected president.
Maduro unlawfully refused to peacefully cede power after the Venezuelan people voted him out of office in the 2024 election.
So therefore Maduro was a fugitive from justice. He is the head of a vicious Foreign Terrorist Organization Cartel de los Soles.
This regime-sponsored enterprise coordinates with and relies on other vicious criminal organizations, namely Tren de Aragua, again, among others, to carry out its objective of using illegal narcotics as a weapon against the United States.
For its part, Tren de Aragua is a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization with thousands of members, many of whom have unlawfully infiltrated the United States and are conducting irregular warfare and undertaking hostile actions against the American people and against the United States.
Its terrorizing criminals commit brutal crimes, including murders, kidnappings, extortions, and human, drug, and weapons trafficking.
This administration, President Trump will not stand for it. In fact, in March of 2025, President Trump declared that “Tren de Aragua is undertaking hostile actions and conducting irregular warfare against the territory of the United States both directly and at the direction, clandestine or otherwise, of the Maduro regime in Venezuela.”
Maduro and his cronies have partnered with some of the most violent and prolific drug traffickers and narco-terrorists in the world for decades facilitating the flood of illegal drugs coming into the United States, estimated to be several hundred tons annually.
He has become rich, incredibly wealthy, off the misery of untold numbers of Americans, Venezuelans, and others, aiding and abetting international terrorist organizations like Hizballah, coordinating with corrupt Iranian officials, and other malign actors to influence not only the region but to malignly influence the United States.
In fact, in its own 2025 World Drug Report, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime identified Venezuela as a key trafficking route in the Western Hemisphere, the illegal drugs predominantly cocaine entering the United States and increasingly Europe.
As Secretary Rubio stated just yesterday, this is the Western Hemisphere. This is where we live – and we’re not going to allow the Western Hemisphere to be used as a base of operation for our nation’s adversaries, and competitors, and rivals of the United States.
You can’t turn Venezuela into the operating hub for Iran, for Hizballah, for gangs, for the Cuban intelligence agents and other malign actors that control that country.
You cannot continue to have the largest energy reserves in the world under the control of adversaries of the United States, under the control of illegitimate leaders, and not benefiting the people of Venezuela, and stolen by a handful of oligarchs inside of Venezuela.
But it doesn’t stop there. Numerous UN and international human rights organizations have issued reports documenting serious human rights abuses by the Maduro regime, including reports of extrajudicial killings, political prisoners, torture and arbitrary and unlawful detentions.
In fact, over 8 million Venezuelans have fled the country, destabilizing their neighbors in the region and creating the world’s largest refugee crisis.
Members of this Council, colleagues, the United States wants a better future for Venezuela. We believe a better future for the people of Venezuela and for the people of the region and the world is stabilizing the region and making the neighborhood that we live in a much better and safer place.
And this is why millions of Venezuelans that have fled this brutal regime are celebrating and cheering around the world as this body pontificates. Including those celebrating it, including in my home state of Florida, where hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans have fled this regime’s brutality.
I want to reiterate President Trump gave diplomacy a chance. He offered Maduro multiple off ramps. He tried to de-escalate. Maduro refused to take them. President Trump made it clear that the narcoterrorism must stop, and yet it continued.
The United States will not waver in our actions to protect Americans from the scourge of narcoterrorism and seeks peace, liberty and justice for the great people of Venezuela.
I thank you Mr. President.”
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