🧨 “We’re Going to Run Venezuela” — Trump Just Announced Colonial Rule on Live TV. It's Despicable and Illegal.

They bombed Caracas, seized the president, and now say U.S. corporations will take the oil. This is theft, not “freedom.”

They bombed Venezuela’s capital. They seized the sitting president and his wife. And now Donald Trump is standing at a podium saying the United States will “run” Venezuela and bring in “very large United States oil companies” to “start making money.”

That’s not a slip of the tongue. That’s the truth coming out of the empire’s mouth.

Before I go further, I need to ask you from the heart to click here to become a member and click here to join as a monthly, annual, or founding member. 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. Your support keeps this work free for them, and even for you when you can’t afford to pay.

Now let’s talk about what Trump just confessed to the world.

According to the report you shared, Trump said the United States will “run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition.” He said, “We don’t want to be involved with having somebody else get in.”Then he went even further and laid out the real plan: he said “very large United States oil companies” would move into Venezuela to “fix” the oil infrastructure and “start making money for the country.” He promised this would make Venezuelans “rich, independent and safe.”

That is colonialism in plain English.

When a foreign power bombs your capital, kidnaps your leader, announces it will “run” your country, and then invites its corporations to “start making money” off your natural resources, that is not liberation. That is theft. That is occupation language. That is what empires have always said right before they put their boot on a nation’s neck and call it “order.”

And I need Americans to hear this: the U.S. is not even pretending anymore. This isn’t coded language. It’s not “strategic partnership.” It’s not “supporting democracy.” It’s not “counterterrorism.”

It’s: we will run you, and we will take your oil.

Now, I already know the propaganda is coming. “But people are cheering.” “But Maduro is unpopular.” “But he’s indicted.” “But it’s about drugs.” “But Venezuela has suffered under him.”

Listen to me.

Cheering crowds do not make kidnapping a president legal.

If someone stormed into America, bombed parts of Washington, D.C., snatched Donald Trump, and announced they were taking him overseas to stand trial, millions of Americans would cheer. They would throw parties. They would call it justice. They would chant and celebrate.

Would that make it lawful? Would that make it legitimate? Would that make it moral?

Of course not.

In almost any country on earth, if a president is seized, there will always be some group of citizens who approve. That is not how legality works. That is not how international order is evaluated. That is not how sovereignty is judged.

The question is not, “Did some people celebrate?”

The question is: Do you have the legal authority to invade a sovereign state and remove its leader by force?

And the answer under international law is almost always: no.

International law is not an abstract philosophy. It’s the thin line between a world where borders mean something and a world where the strongest country can rewrite reality whenever it wants. The U.N. Charter—the document the modern world built after World War II—sets a basic rule: states cannot use force against other states except in narrow circumstances like legitimate self-defense or with clear authorization by the U.N. Security Council.

That’s the baseline. Without it, the planet becomes a hunting ground.

So when Trump says “we will run Venezuela,” what he is really saying is: the U.N. Charter doesn’t matter. Your sovereignty doesn’t matter. The rules do not apply to us.

And I need you to see how many layers of the story reinforce that.

This didn’t begin last night. This was months of escalation: seizures of Venezuelan oil tankers, bombing “drug boats,” threats of blockade, buildup of U.S. forces in the region. Now the escalation has reached the most blatant act possible: a direct strike inside the country and the seizure of the head of state.

The question of congressional authorization in the United States is also deeply contested. The New York Times has already reported lawmakers saying Trump bypassed Congress and that the administration misrepresented its intentions. That is not a small procedural gripe. That’s the difference between a country that still believes it is governed by law and a country governed by executive force.

But here’s the truth that keeps landing heavier with every day: none of those guardrails seem to matter anymore.

And more than anything, the genocide in Gaza has taught the world that international law means next to nothing when the U.S. decides to ignore it.

For over two years, the world has watched Gaza be crushed. We’ve watched starvation, mass displacement, mass bombing, aid workers killed, journalists killed, hospitals destroyed—while the U.N. issues statements and the United States provides weapons and vetoes. We’ve watched the strongest states intimidate courts and bully institutions. We’ve watched “human rights” become a slogan used only against enemies, never against allies.

So yes, we are now in the age of unchecked power.

What’s happening in Venezuela is not separate from what happened in Gaza. It’s the same operating principle: power first, law later, accountability never.

And the most obscene part is that Trump is saying the quiet part out loud: this isn’t only about “narco-terrorism” or “democracy.” This is about oil. He’s inviting American corporations to take over the industry and “start making money.”

Do you know what that is? That’s not “help.” That’s not “rebuilding.” That’s not “development.”

That is the old colonial playbook, updated for television.

Step one: declare the target country illegitimate.
Step two: label the leadership “terrorists,” “narcos,” “criminals.”
Step three: strike, destabilize, remove leadership.
Step four: bring in corporations to extract resources.
Step five: call it a “safe, proper transition.”

The reason this is so dangerous isn’t only what it does to Venezuela. It’s what it does to the world. Because if the U.S. can do this to an oil-rich Latin American country today, it can do it to others tomorrow. It can do it to Mexico under the banner of “cartels.” It can do it to any state that becomes inconvenient. And it can do it while daring the U.N. to do anything but hold an “emergency meeting.”

The world is already responding with condemnation—Brazil’s president calling it a first step toward a world where the law of the strongest prevails, U.N. officials calling it a dangerous precedent, legal experts calling it an illegal abduction, major powers warning it violates sovereignty. But we’ve seen this movie before. Condemnation without enforcement becomes background noise. And Washington counts on that.

Because Washington knows something grim: no nation or court is willing to hold the United States accountable.

Not really. Not materially. Not in a way that changes behavior.

So the empire does what it wants.

And then it acts shocked when the global order collapses.

Family, I’m not telling you to like Maduro. I’m telling you to see what the United States just did. If you can’t name this for what it is, then the words “colonialism” and “sovereignty” and “international law” no longer mean anything at all.

A sovereign state was bombed. Its leader was seized. Its resources were openly discussed as a corporate prize. And the president of the United States used the word “run.”

That’s not democracy. That’s not justice. That’s not freedom.

That’s empire.

And the only reason the empire feels safe saying it out loud is because it believes Americans won’t stop it—and because it believes the world can’t.

If you want me to keep writing and digging and connecting the dots—without being bought, without being intimidated, and while keeping this work free for the world—please stand with me. Please click here to become a member and click here to join as a monthly, annual, or founding member.

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

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