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United States President Donald Trump confirmed Sunday that he spoke by phone with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro but declined to disclose details of the conversation.
“I don’t want to comment on it. The answer is yes,” Trump told reporters while returning to Washington from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, where he spent Thanksgiving. “I wouldn’t say it went well or badly,” he added. “I can’t do that.”
The New York Times reported Friday that the two leaders discussed a potential meeting during their call last week, citing sources familiar with the matter.
Trump dismissed speculation that his recent threat to shut down Venezuelan airspace signaled imminent military action.
“Don’t read anything into it,” he said.
Still, tensions between Washington and Caracas are rising, as Trump recently declared Venezuelan airspace “completely shut down” and said the U.S. would soon take action on land to halt alleged Venezuelan drug trafficking.
On Sunday, Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., told CNN’s “State of the Union” that the U.S. has offered Maduro an opportunity to flee to Russia or another country. Venezuela rejected the claim and demanded “unconditional respect” for its airspace.
The exchange follows months of expanding U.S. military operations across Latin America. The Pentagon has deployed Marines, warships, fighter jets, bombers, submarines, and drones amid growing concerns that Washington may consider military options.
Since September, U.S. forces have carried out 21 strikes at sea, reportedly targeting drug trafficking vessels and killing at least 83 people. Trump said Thursday that similar actions on land would begin “very soon.”
In response to what it called U.S. “aggression,” Venezuela requested help from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its members. In a letter read by Vice President and Oil Minister Delcy Rodriguez, Maduro accused Washington of trying to seize the country’s vast oil reserves using “military force.”
“OPEC must stop this aggression,” Rodriguez said during a virtual meeting of the bloc’s ministers.
Washington has long accused Maduro of leading the so-called “Cartel of the Suns” and placed a $50 million reward on his capture. Venezuela denies the cartel’s existence, while experts say the term broadly refers to corruption by officials linked to criminal gangs.
The United States does not recognize Maduro’s victory in last year’s presidential election and continues to back opposition efforts to remove him from office.
Media reports last week alleged that in one September operation, U.S. forces conducted a second strike that killed survivors of an earlier airstrike. According to The Washington Post and CNN, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had issued a directive to “kill everybody.”
Trump, however, denied that Hegseth gave such an order.
“We’ll look into it, but no, I wouldn’t have wanted that — not a second strike,” he said. “Pete said he did not order the death of those two men.”
Jorge Rodriguez, head of Venezuela’s legislature, said Sunday that he met with relatives of victims of the U.S. strikes. He refrained from commenting on the Trump–Maduro call but addressed the reported “kill order.”
“If a war had been declared and led to such killings, we would be talking about war crimes,” Rodriguez said. “Given that no war has been declared, what happened... can only be characterized as murder or extrajudicial executions.”
The U.S. has deployed its largest aircraft carrier to the Caribbean, while fighter jets and bombers have conducted flights near the Venezuelan coast. Six commercial airlines have canceled flights to the country, but Caracas airport operations remained normal on Sunday.
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