Trump asks Rubio to lead Venezuela overhaul after Maduro arrest

Hadriana Lowenkron and Kate Sullivan, Bloomberg News on Jan 5, 2026

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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio to lead the process to implement economic and political reforms in Venezuela and the U.S. believes it is getting “full, complete and total” cooperation from the government in Caracas after the capture of Nicolas Maduro, White House senior adviser Stephen Miller said Monday.

Trump requested Rubio “under the president’s close guidance and direction, to be the lead on this process,” Miller told reporters at the White House. The secretary of State will lead a team that includes officials working on energy, financial, and military policy, he added.

“It’s a big team, a group of people — everybody’s working great and closely together,” Miller said.

The White House has provided few details of how exactly it plans to administer Venezuela following the daring raid to capture Maduro, who pleaded not guilty Monday to U.S. charges in a narco-terrorism case against him.

Trump, meanwhile, has simply said that the U.S. would “run” the country until it held new elections and that major oil producers were prepared to spend billions of dollars to tap the Latin American country’s valuable crude reserves. The U.S. president suggested in an interview with NBC News that the administration may subsidize efforts by energy companies to rebuild Venezuela’s oil industry.

Still, both economic and political efforts in Venezuela could prove incredibly complex, leaving a bevy of practical and policy questions unanswered.

Rubio, for his part, has largely sidestepped those questions by indicating that the U.S. would seek to exert influence on the remaining Venezuelan government through economic coercion and the threat of additional military action.

Trump and Miller have both said that Delcy Rodríguez, who served as Maduro’s vice president and was sworn in Monday as his successor, was assisting with their efforts despite publicly denouncing his apprehension.

“We are very much getting full, complete and total cooperation from the government of Venezuela, and as a result of that cooperation, the people of Venezuela are going to become richer than they ever have before, and of course, the United States is going to benefit from this massively in terms of economic security and military cooperation,” Miller said.

Trump, speaking in the NBC interview, shot down speculation that the U.S. may have been coordinating with Rodríguez before Maduro’s capture. He also said there was a need to “fix the country” before staging new elections.

“We have to nurse the country back to health,” he said.

In addition to Rubio and Miller, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Vice President JD Vance are expected to have key roles in the Venezuela effort, Trump said.

“It’s a group of all. They have all expertise, different expertise,” he said.

At the same time, Trump responded to a question of who was ultimately in charge by identifying himself.

The United Nations Security Council held an emergency meeting Monday following the operation, where nations criticized Trump’s move.

Officials expressed concern about the U.S. president signaling the possibility of expanding military actions into Colombia and Mexico, predicting the collapse of Cuba and repeating his threat to seize Greenland from Danish control in the name of American national security.

U.N. Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo, speaking on behalf of Secretary General Antonio Guterres, said in a statement they “remain deeply concerned that rules of international law have not been respected.”

U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Mike Waltz defended the raid and said it was limited in scope.

“There is no war against Venezuela or its people. We are not occupying a country. This was a law enforcement operation,” Waltz said.

Trump, speaking to NBC News, also expressed confidence that his supporters would back his decisions on Venezuela, which threatens to alienate parts of his base that embraced him for pledging to keep the US out of foreign wars.

“MAGA loves it. MAGA loves what I’m doing. MAGA loves everything I do,” Trump told NBC. “MAGA is me. MAGA loves everything I do, and I love everything I do, too.”

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(With assistance from Skylar Woodhouse.)

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