In his hourlong press conference following the early morning capture of Venezuela's leader and his wife, President Donald Trump justified the operation as one in line with a more than 200-year-old foreign policy agenda, the Monroe Doctrine.
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The doctrine, which the president has called the "Donroe Doctrine," has for years been relegated to foreign policy history, from which recent administrations have sought to distance themselves. But more than a decade after then-U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, under former President Barack Obama, announced the "era of Monroe Doctrine is over," Trump is now embracing it.
In his remarks on Jan. 3, the president cast the doctrine as a continuing tenet of U.S. foreign policy, and said the operation that ousted Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro not only abides by it, but goes a step further. Trump alleged the country was "hosting foreign adversaries" and "acquiring offensive weapons" and accused Venezuela of seizing and selling American oil assets.
"All of these actions were in gross violation of the core principles of American foreign policy, dating back more than two centuries," Trump said. "All the way back, dated to the Monroe doctrines. And the Monroe Doctrine is a big deal, but we've superseded it by a lot, by a real lot. They now call it the Donroe doctrine."
