Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday joined ABC News' "This Week" anchor George Stephanopoulos for an interview, where the host straight-up asked him what "legal authority" the U.S. has to run Venezuela after capturing its president and his wife. If you lived through the Bush years, you can see right through the hogwash the Trump administration is serving the public. First, the attack was over drugs, and now Donald Trump has admitted that it's all about the oil.
"President Trump was pretty clear yesterday. He said the United States is going to run Venezuela. Under what legal authority?" Stephanopoulos asked.
"Well, first of all, what's going to happen here is that we have a quarantine on their oil," Rubio said. "That means their economy will not be able to move forward until the conditions that are in the national interest of the United States and the interests of the Venezuelan people are met,"
"And that's what we intend to do. So that leverage remains," he continued. "That leverage is ongoing. And we expect that it's going to lead to results here. We're hopeful, hopeful that it does positive results for the people of Venezuela. But ultimately, most importantly for u in the national interest of the United States, we will no longer have, hopefully, as we move forward here."
"And obviously, we want a better future for the people of Venezuela. We want them to have an oil industry where the wealth goes to the people, not to a handful of corrupt individuals and is stolen by pirates all over the world," he insisted.
"Let me ask the question again. What is the legal authority for the United States to be running Venezuela?" Stephanopoulos asked.
"Well, I explained to you what our goals are and how we're going to use the leverage to make it happen," Rubio said. "As far as what our legal authority is on the quarantine, I'm very simple. We have court orders. These are sanctioned boats, and we get orders from courts."
Rubio said that Maduro was someone the U.S. "simply couldn't work with," and added that the administration was not recognizing Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez as the current legitimate leader.
There it is! It's about regime change, oil, and greed. They keep moving the goalposts. And there are no "court orders" that give Trump the legal authority to take over a country. Trump is responsible for the deaths of at least 40 people who were killed in the U.S. attack on Venezuela early Saturday, including military personnel and civilians, and I'm sure the deceased feel liberated by this administration, including Rosa Gonzalez, 80, who died during the attack.
