Trump's unauthorized Venezuela attack won't help Americans | Opinion

President Donald Trump didn’t ask Congress’ permission to take military action against Venezuela and haul away the South American nation’s president to stand trial in the United States.

He also, importantly, didn’t ask your permission. There was no effort to garner or gauge public support for this likely illegal endeavor. You and I and all U.S. citizens were simply told, as Trump said Jan. 3, that America is going to run Venezuela for a while.

“We're going to run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition,” Trump said in the wake of the attack.

Well, that’s just super. I didn’t ask for this. I never heard anybody ask for this. In fact, I doubt many, if any, Americans voted for Trump because they wanted regime change in a country they’d struggle to locate on a map.

People are worried about food and health insurance, not Venezuela

The president just up and did it, and still hasn’t provided a sound justification as to how it makes our lives better in a moment when millions of Americans are seeing their health care premiums skyrocket and food prices remain high.

Based on Trump’s recent polling numbers, few are happy with the way he’s running OUR country. And now he thinks he can handle another one for a bit as well? Please.

To be sure, nobody’s going to shed a tear for Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro ‒ he’s a bad dude. But my understanding of the last U.S. presidential election was that people reelected Trump because he said he’d bring down grocery prices on day one. People voted for him because he said he would bring America into a new "Golden Age."

Trump said in his inaugural address: “My proudest legacy will be that of a peacemaker and unifier.”

Oops.

You think oil will pay for Trump's Venezuela fiasco? Hah!

The president is fulfilling zero promises, and now he seems to have marched America into a costly occupation of a foreign country, limply suggesting that Venezuela’s oil will help pay for everything.

“It won't cost us anything because the money coming out of the ground is very substantial,” Trump said from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, where he and his big-boy Cabinet members like Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio oversaw the Venezuelan raid.

Those echoes you're hearing are coming from the Iraq War

I’m trying to think of a time in the past when an administration has assured Americans that a country’s oil will cover the cost of occupying that country.

Ah, yes, there was Richard Perle, chair of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board, in 2002 talking about the war in Iraq: “The likely economic effects would be relatively small. …. Under every plausible scenario, the negative effect will be quite small relative to the economic benefits.”

And Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, talking about Iraq in 2003: “When it comes to reconstruction, before we turn to the American taxpayer, we will turn first to the resources of the Iraqi government and the international community.”

And Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in 2003, also talking about Iraq: “We are talking about a country that can really finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon.”

Cool, cool, cool.

Trump's attack on Venezuela has nothing to do with drugs

And what of Trump’s explanation that we attacked Venezuela to stop the flow of drugs into America? Per The New York Times' editorial board:

"The claim is particularly ludicrous in this case, given that Venezuela is not a meaningful producer of fentanyl or the other drugs that have dominated the recent epidemic of overdoses in the United States, and the cocaine that it does produce flows mostly to Europe. While Mr. Trump has been attacking Venezuelan boats, he also pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández, who ran a sprawling drug operation when he was president of Honduras from 2014 to 2022.”

We didn’t ask for this invasion. No normal person was pressing for the United States to meddle in Venezuela. The primary concerns people have right now involve putting food on the table, keeping their jobs from being wiped out by artificial intelligence and affording health insurance.

The Trump administration never made the case to attack Venezuela

So I’d like Trump administration officials to let Americans get a look at the price tag of the likely quagmire they just plunked the country into. I’d like to know who actually wanted this nonsensical military action, what the administration’s plan is moving forward, and how any of this is going to do a damn thing to help the average American.

As we sit here, not even a week into 2026 and already on another imperialistic blood-for-oil campaign, I’m guessing I’m not alone in wanting answers.

Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on Bluesky at @rexhuppke.bsky.social and on Facebook at facebook.com/RexIsAJerk