The top Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security subcommittee once blasted President Donald Trump for not taking action after Nicolás Maduro retained power following the disputed 2019 election against Juan Guaidó.
This week, Sen. Christopher Murphy’s tone appeared to change after the Connecticut Democrat denounced Trump’s operation to arrest the dictator this weekend in a tweetstorm.
In January 2019, the Venezuelan political crisis reached its peak with the inauguration of Maduro after a disputed election. The election of the Socialist party leader had been declared invalid by opposition members of the National Assembly, and opposition candidate Juan Guaidó declared himself acting president.
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Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton stated at the time that the US “will not recognize the unlawful inauguration of the Maduro dictatorship.”
At the time, Murphy responded to the Trump administration’s tactics by blasting the White House on January 23 of that year for failing to address Maduro’s illegitimate stranglehold on power.
“If Trump cared about consistency, he would make a realistic case for intervention in Venezuela (getting rid of Maduro is good for the United States) instead of trying to pretend his administration is suddenly concerned about toppling anti-democratic regimes,” Murphy tweeted.
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He added that US foreign policy has always been a “muddle of values- and interest-based decisions” but that Trump is “going to the extreme” by embracing autocrats.
“Strongmen around the world are confused,” Murphy added, appearing to compare the US response to Maduro’s inauguration to the apparent “defense of a dictator who dismembered a political opponent” — an apparent reference to Saudi-born Washington Post writer Jamal Khashoggi, whose October 2018 assassination many believed was the fault of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Fast forward to the present: Murphy blasted Trump for masterminding the operation that arrested Maduro on drug trafficking and other charges, detained him aboard the USS Iwo Jima and jailed him in Brooklyn.
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“Maduro’s illegitimate election does not give the President the power to invade without congressional approval, nor does it create a national security justification,” Murphy tweeted after the despot’s arrest.
“That claim is laughable. This is about satisfying Trump’s vanity, making up for long-standing neoconservative grudges against Maduro, enriching Trump’s oil industry, and distracting voters from Epstein and rising costs.”
Murphy added that Trump believes he is above the law and can “steal” from taxpayers.
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“And now he is starting an illegal war with Venezuela that the Americans did not ask for and that has nothing to do with our security.”
“How does going to war in South America help ordinary Americans who are struggling? What does this do to drug entry into the US if Venezuela is not producing fentanyl? What is the actual security threat to the United States? And what happens next in Venezuela? He cannot answer these questions.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Murphy’s office for comment.
In response to another related message from Murphy, from the White House Rapid Response47 arm called the Connecticut lawmaker a “buffoon” and said that if he believed the operation had nothing to do with national security, he should “tell that to the families of the innocent Americans who were brutally murdered by the gang members the regime imported here – or the drugs they trafficked here; you’re sick.’
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At a special event in March 2025 with Venezuelan expats in the U.S., led by Guaidó and Rep. Carlos Gimenez, R-Fla., the Venezuelan opposition leader praised Trump for actions taken at the time to undo a Biden-era oil deal with Maduro’s government.
“[W]We need a strong, prosperous and secure Latin America – and one that will be secure, with democracy and freedom,” Guaidó said in Spanish from the Diplomatic Lounge at Miami International Airport.
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“I have no doubts about President Trump, and the message he is sending straight to the hearts of those who financed the dictatorship coup of July 28, 2024 (Maduro’s controversial re-election),” he said.
Guaidó warned that it was also time to confront Western despots who “usurp” power, such as in Cuba and Nicaragua, warning them that they “will not go unpunished.”
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