🧨 Here is the Unsealed Maduro Indictment. Not ONE WORD about Fentanyl after Trump Claimed for MONTHS this is why Venezuela was a Danger to America

They bombed Venezuela, kidnapped its president, and the paperwork doesn’t even match the propaganda

They kidnapped the President and First Lady of Venezuela and dragged them to jail in New York. Reports say dozens of civilians were killed in the operation. And now they want you to believe an outrageous 25-page indictment is the moral justification for what might be one of the single most outrageous moments in American colonialism.

It’s preposterous. It’s grotesque. And it is exactly what unchecked empire looks like.

For MONTHS on end Trump said all of this was about fentanyl. Except that word, “fentanyl,” isn’t mentioned ONE TIME in the entire indictment. Suddenly it’s no longer the issue at hand here.

Before I go any further, I need to ask you from the heart to become a member today. I keep this work free for the world—for readers in Gaza, for students in public schools, for families living in deep poverty, for elders on fixed incomes—because a smaller circle of people who can afford it chooses to carry the cost. Please click here to become a memberand please click here to join as a monthly, annual, or founding member. Your support keeps this work free for them, and even for you when you can’t afford to pay.

Now let’s talk about the indictment—because it’s the smoking gun.

Unsealed Maduro Indictment

557KB ∙ PDF file

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See for yourself. This whole thing is a scam. He's not being charged with ANYTHING Trump has lied about for months on end. Not ONE WORD about fentanyl. NOTHING.

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The first thing you should notice is how the document announces itself: “SEALED SUPERSEDING INDICTMENT”in the Southern District of New York.

It’s not a “breaking emergency” drafted overnight. It’s part of a long-running prosecutorial frame that Washington is now using as a propaganda shield for a military assault.

Then look at what the indictment actually says, and more importantly, what it DOES NOT SAY about the very thing, fentanyl, Trump has said was the cause of his aggression against Maduro.

The indictment opens by alleging that for over 25 years Venezuelan leaders corrupted institutions “to import tons of cocaine into the United States,” and it alleges Maduro used “illegally obtained authority” and corrupted institutions “to transport thousands of tons of cocaine to the United States.”

It calls him a “now-de facto ruler,” and later calls him the “de facto but illegitimate ruler of the country.”

That’s what this document is: a flimsy cocaine case wrapped in political language.

Not an “oil theft” case.

Not the story Trump has been screaming from podiums while U.S. forces have been slaughtering people at sea and now bombing another country.

The indictment’s narrative is about cocaine. It alleges networks through Colombia, the Caribbean, Central America, Mexico, and it even cites an estimate that “between 200 and 250 tons of cocaine” were trafficked through Venezuela annually.

And then it gets even more absurd.

Because after laying out cocaine allegations, the indictment stacks on weapons charges.

Count Three is titled “Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices.”

It alleges that the defendants “used and carried firearms” and “knowingly possessed firearms,” including machine guns and “destructive devices,” during and in relation to drug trafficking crimes.

So yes—after the United States bombs a country, kidnaps its president, and claims it’s all about drug threats… the U.S. turns around and charges that president and his wife under a machine gun statute.

Read that slowly.

America.
A country with hundreds of millions of guns in circulation.
A country where you can buy guns with your milk at Walmart.
A country where schools have shooter drills like it’s weather.
A country that refuses the most basic gun reforms because it worships its own violence.

That America is now holding up “machineguns and destructive devices” charges as part of its moral case for kidnapping a head of state.

It is moral rot.

And it’s the kind of moral rot that only happens when a superpower believes it is untouchable.

Now, here’s the detail that says everything about what this is really about: the only place the word “oil” appears in this indictment is not as “stolen oil.” It’s a passing reference to a plane owned by Venezuela’s state oil company—PDVSA.

That’s it. Not “theft.” Not “our oil.” Not the grand oil narrative Trump uses to whip up support for colonial actions.

Just: “state oil company.”

So why does that matter?

Because Trump’s public story has been one long “America is under threat” performance. He has used drug panic to justify violence. He has used oil rhetoric to justify seizures and blockades. He has normalized “we have to do something” as a way to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, to whoever he wants.

But this indictment reveals what they actually want to do: launder an invasion into a criminal case.

And I’m going to be blunt: that is the most dangerous precedent of all.

Because once a superpower convinces itself it can seize a foreign leader and put them on trial in New York whenever it finds an indictment convenient, the world is no longer living under law. The world is living under the law of the strongest.

That’s not a slogan. That’s the exact warning so many leaders have been making for years. It’s the warning that the UN Charter was created to prevent: a global order where powerful states decide borders and leaders and outcomes through force.

That’s why this moment has to be named for what it is: colonialism.

Colonialism isn’t only old photos of soldiers and flags. Colonialism is when a powerful country claims the right to control weaker nations “for their own good.” Colonialism is when you remove a leader and announce you will “manage” the country until a “proper transition.” Colonialism is when you invite corporations to “fix” infrastructure and “start making money” off someone else’s resources.

And it’s colonialism when you bomb a capital, kill civilians, and then say the victim is the criminal because you wrote an indictment.

Now, I want to be disciplined here.

This is not a defense of Maduro’s governance. It’s not a denial that corruption exists. It’s not an argument that no one in Venezuela has ever trafficked cocaine. That’s not the point.

The point is that even if every word of the indictment were true, it still would not justify what the United States just did.

Because international law does not permit a country to bomb another sovereign state and kidnap its head of government to prosecute them. The UN Charter doesn’t contain an exception that says, “Unless you have a superseding indictment.”

And if anyone tries to argue that this is merely an “arrest,” that’s propaganda. This wasn’t an arrest carried out with Venezuela’s consent or through extradition. It was a military operation. It was force. It was bombing. It was seizure.

And here is where Gaza has changed everything.

For more than two years now, the world has watched genocide be carried out in broad daylight—starvation, mass killing, displacement, the destruction of hospitals—while the UN issues statements, the U.S. ships weapons, and the powerful bully the institutions that were built to stop crimes like this.

So yes, international law means next to nothing when the empire decides it doesn’t apply. The United Nations means next to nothing when the empire treats it as theater. We are in the age of unchecked power.

This indictment is proof of that.

Look at the language inside the indictment itself. It calls Maduro’s government “corrupt” and “illegitimate,” and it calls him a “de facto but illegitimate ruler.”

That may be Washington’s political view, but prosecutors are not supposed to write like campaign operatives. That’s not the neutral language of justice. That is the language of regime change.

And the indictment’s own structure makes the propaganda even clearer: it’s built to sound like a global crime saga—FARC, ELN, Sinaloa, Zetas, Tren de Aragua—then it pivots to drug statutes and a machine gun statute.

That is designed to overwhelm the public and make the invasion feel “obvious.”

But it’s not obvious. It’s lawless.

And the hypocrisy is unbearable.

The United States has supported dictators and juntas all over the world when it served our interests. The United States has committed war crimes without consequences. The United States has run black sites, tortured people, bombed civilians, toppled governments, and then called itself the keeper of “order.”

Now it’s doing it again—openly.

Family, I need Americans to understand something: this is not just about Venezuela. This is about precedent. This is about whether any country is safe from being declared “illegitimate,” bombed, and then “managed” by the United States.

Because once you accept the logic that America can kidnap leaders to try them, you have accepted that sovereignty is conditional. And sovereignty being conditional is another way of saying: empire rules.

And the most sickening part of all is how the propaganda will be sold.

They will show you Venezuelans celebrating. They will show you immigrants cheering in Florida. They will say this proves it was “good.”

But cheering crowds don’t legalize anything.

In almost any country on earth, if a leader is seized, you will find groups who approve. Millions of Americans would cheer if someone took Trump. That’s not a moral test. That’s not a legal test. That’s not how the world is supposed to work.

The only question that matters is the one they want you to stop asking:

Who gave the United States the right?

Nobody did.

And that’s why this is evil.

Because if nobody can restrain the strongest country on earth, then the world is being pushed back into a pre-law era—where power takes what it wants, calls it justice, and dares anyone to resist.

If you want me to keep doing this work—reading the documents, translating the propaganda, naming the moral reality without flinching—I need you with me. Please click here to become a member and please click here to join as a monthly, annual, or founding member. This work stays free for the world, but it only survives if some of you decide to carry it.

Love and appreciate each of you.
Your friend and brother,
Shaun

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