From New York Post: “The View” co-host Sunny Hostin condemned the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as a “kidnapping,” comparing recent United States policy in the region to piracy.
The US military and intelligence agencies worked together over the weekend to capture Maduro, in a mission called “Operation Absolute Resolve.”
While Maduro’s reign was controversial, and was viewed by many as a far-left dictatorship, critics accused the Trump administration of overstepping its authority.
“It’s not legal because it violates international law, right?” Hostin said, claiming that “the US government killed over 100 people, including civilians and military in Venezuela during this kidnapping and capture, and international law doesn’t allow it unless Congress declares war, and Congress did not do that.”
“So this country was founded on the premise of the balance of power, right?” she continued. “So you have a [sic] checks and balances. So you have co-equal powers — co-equal branches of power. So you have the judicial branch, and then you have the executive branch, which the president is a part of, and then you have, of course, the legislative branch, and that’s Congress, and they are supposed to check each other. This president is doing whatever the heck he wants without any checks or balances, and I have never in my lifetime seen this type of regime change, which is what we just saw, work out well for the United States. It just doesn’t work, and in my view, this is completely, completely, 100% illegal.”
Hostin then claimed that oil was the key incentive for the operation, and she compared the Trump administration’s policy in the region to piracy.
“The thing that’s interesting to me is Venezuela — I don’t think a lot of people know — owns 20% of the world’s oil. More than Saudi Arabia. And Trump for months, we’ve been saying at this table, ‘This is about the oil,’ but for months Trump was saying, ‘This is about narco-terrorism. This is about drugs being brought to this country.’ When you look at the indictment, it’s about drugs being brought to this country.”
She then went on to ask, “Isn’t anyone concerned about the fact that what we’re doing is almost piracy? It’s like imperialism. We’re going to another country, and we’re taking their natural resources for ourselves and on top of it, if we can do something like this, who is to say that Vladimir Putin, then, doesn’t go to Ukraine and arrest Zelensky?”
Sunny Hostin falsely claims the raid was “100% illegal” despite America having a warrant and the Noriega precedent. She cites unspecified “international law” (which doesn’t exist), whines about the military killing Maduro’s security detail, falsely calls it a “kidnapping” and a… pic.twitter.com/B8OXAr0UTL
— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) January 5, 2026
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