Donald Trump has done it again.
In ordering the targeted capture of illegitimate Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, he’s pulled off a feat that stunned Washington.
His critics on left and right called it risky and impossible — but Venezuelans all around the world are thanking him, cheering in the streets from Miami to Buenos Aires.
A hallmark of his second term is how much the commander-in-chief keeps his own counsel.
His cabinet holds widely varied opinions, marked by vastly different experience than the old foreign policy hands and aged generals brought in during his first term.
They clearly disagree about significant decisions. So does a cacophony of outside forces, supporters and critics alike.
But while this president chatted on podcasts to win an election, that doesn’t mean he has to listen to those yammering influencers now.
And when the final decision has to be made, Trump is willing to take the risk, with confidence in the capability of the American military to do what it does best.
It may not rise to the level of the daring operation to demolish the Iranian nuclear program, but destroying a nation’s military in Caracas and exfiltrating its belligerent leader in less time than it takes to watch the finale of “Stranger Things” is quite the achievement.
Call it the first triumph of the “Donroe Doctrine.”
Just a week into the new year, the hottest new trend for 2026 is America’s fifth president, James Monroe.
His doctrine, voiced 200 years ago, sent a message to the then-dominant powers of Europe that their meddling in the Western Hemisphere would not be tolerated.
Now, it’s other powers who want to establish greater footprints in South America.
Mere hours before Maduro’s capture, he was meeting with China’s liaison.
The prospect of a corrupt despot operating on our doorstep as a military and resource tool of China, Russia, Iran and other ne’er-do-well nations at odds with American interests was never going to pass muster with Trump.
Of course, the same Democratic senators who called for Maduro to be pushed out after he lost election in 2024, and hailed Joe Biden’s $25 million dollar bounty on Maduro’s capture, now decry Trump for doing exactly that.
They should be mailing him a check instead.
Whenever this president achieves any goal his critics once said was good but impossible, their primary reaction is finding ways to be offended.
The current talking point from congressional Democrats — those who aren’t lighting their hair on fire and shrieking about war crimes — is that they’re offended they weren’t told in advance.
As Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in the after-action press conference, “This is not the kind of mission where you can pre-notify, because it endangers the mission.”
Trump summarized why: “Congress has a tendency to leak.”
Of course this is not, legally, an act of war.
Just because he falsely claimed to be his country’s leader doesn’t make Maduro off-limits.
He and his wife were effectively fugitives from American justice. As such, the United States can reach out and grab them whether they live in a palace or not.
But that’s what the American left is reduced to — tying themselves in knots to back even a murderous profiteering dictator, so long as it means never having to credit Donald Trump.
What comes next will be challenging, messy, and require enormous work by America and major corporate interests.
Maduro and his cronies used Venezuela’s vast resources for their own personal gain.
They starved their people and wrecked the economy of a nation that was once a jewel of South America.
Recovering from that corruption will require canny deal-making.
And following Maduro’s stolen election two years ago, it remains unclear who will lead any transition of power.
The presence of the powerful Tren de Aragua narco-terror organization, which has run a sprawling international organization under Maduro’s protection, will prove a challenge, too.
The president has made clear, however, his consistent opposition to the cost and burden of taxpayer-funded nation-building of the kind seen in Afghanistan.
Trump’s approach is more ruthless and clear-eyed, focused on the American interest.
He does not trade in pie-in-the-sky ideas about exporting liberal democracies.
That aspect of the Donroe Doctrine is of the utmost importance.
Do we want what’s best for the people of Venezuela? Of course.
But we want what’s best for America, first.
We’re fortunate to have a president who understands that better than anyone else.
Ben Domenech is editor at large of The Spectator and a Fox News contributor.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
