Trump in uncharted territory with Venezuela regime-change op: What comes after Nicolas Maduro? Explained

Trump's allies called military operation “audacious” as it ousted a South American strongman blasted by US as a “dictator” and “narco-terrorist"

Of the many adjectives used for Donald Trump, ‘bold’ is certainly one that his backers and critics would agree on. Does that mean a good thing, and for whom?

US President Donald Trump at a press conference following military strikes on Venezuela where President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were "captured". (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters Photo)

Answers to these questions may be found after Trump's first major military operation of its kind was carried out on Saturday — regime-change action in Venezuela with the “capture” of President Nicolas Maduro and his wife.

Trump's allies have called the military operation “audacious” and “a major success” as it ousted a South American strongman blasted by the US as an “illegitimate” dictator and a “narco-terrorist".

Follow | Updates on US operation on Venezuela

“It was a brilliant operation, actually," Trump told The New York Times shortly after US forces were cleared from Venezuelan airspace. He later suggested the US would “run” Venezuela until a new regime takes over. He did not share plans for elections or other such details.

Trump has now twice used US forces to carry out risky operations against American adversaries. In June, he directed US strikes on key Iranian nuclear sites.

But the path ahead in Venezuela may throw up more questions than answers. Let's look at some of those:

Who will fill power vacuum now that Maduro is gone?

What now lies ahead for Venezuela, a country that's endured years of hyper-inflation, shortages of food and medicine, and consistent brain drain despite vast oil wealth?

Maduro's top lieutenants quickly took to social media and state TV early Saturday to fill the power vacuum, taking a defiant stand against the Trump administration.

President Trump, however, told Fox News that the US is reviewing what a transition of power will look like in Venezuela, and that it will have an active role in deciding who succeeds Maduro.

Meanwhile, the Communist regime’s most prominent leaders were already asserting their authority over the military and government.

Vice President to succeed Maduro?

Vice President Delcy Rodriguez would be next in line to succeed Maduro under the constitution. She called for national unity and rejected foreign interference, and spoke to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. The Russian government has, however, said that a report she was in Russia was false.

“They have a vice president as you know,” Trump told Fox, when asked who would succeed Maduro.

What about Nobel winner Machado?

Trump also said he would consider whether opposition leader Maria Corina Machado should be in charge. “We can’t take a chance after having done this incredible thing last night of letting somebody else take over, where we have to do it again,” he said.

Machado, the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner, said the candidate she backed in last year’s election, Edmundo Gonzalez, should immediately assume power, and called on the armed forces to back him. But Gonzalez has been in exile in Spain, and Machado has yet to return to Venezuela after traveling to Sweden last month to accept her Nobel Peace Prize.

Ministers among contenders

Another contender is Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, 62, who was the first senior government official to appear in a video on social media, more than three hours after the unrest began. In the message, he urged Venezuelans to remain calm, backed President Maduro’s declaration of a state of emergency, and said national defense measures would be activated to restore order and stability.

Padrino has been Venezuela’s defense minister since October 2014, making him one of the longest-serving officials in the government. Padrino has consistently supported Maduro during major moments of unrest, including the 2017 protests, the 2019 challenge following international recognition of Juan Guaido as interim president, and repeated reports of unrest within the military.

He faces direct US action, though, as the American administration has offered a $15 million reward for information leading to his capture.

Venezuela’s interior minister Diosdado Cabello also appeared on state television early Saturday to urge calm. “What they tried to do with bombs and missiles, they achieved partially,” he said, questioning whether the international community would “become accomplices to this massacre".

Cabello, 62, is the government’s socialist party strongman, controlling loyalists and followers across the country, as well as heading prisons, police and intelligence forces, which the United Nations has said enabled crimes against humanity.

Big moment for Trump, or potential policy disaster?

The operation to remove Maduro means Trump hasn't shied away from flexing US military might even as he has vowed to keep America out of war.

With the Venezuela operation, Trump followed through on a promise, spelled out in his National Security Strategy published in December 2025, to assert US dominance in the Western Hemisphere.

But retired US Navy Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery told news agency AP that the immediate path ahead in Venezuela could be more difficult: “Unlike the (Iran) strikes where Trump did the action and then said ‘fight’s over', he will not have that luxury here in Venezuela,” said Montgomery, an analyst at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, a hawkish think tank in Washington.

“He needs to stay engaged in Venezuela to make sure that Maduro's cronies — equally guilty of any crime he is — are also pushed out of power, and they may want to stay and fight as they don't have too many places to run,” he further opined.

What about global reaction?

European allies had expressed concern already when Trump built up a massive presence of troops in the Caribbean in recent months, and carried out dozens of lethal strikes on suspected drug smugglers. His administration claimed these “drug boats” were effectively an arm of the Maduro government.

Russia's foreign ministry condemned what it called a US “act of armed aggression” against Venezuela in a statement posted on its Telegram channel on Saturday. The ouster of Maduro, who was backed by the Russians, comes as Trump is urging Putin to end his nearly four-year brutal war on Ukraine. China has also criticised the action.

Overall, though, Maduro has hardly been viewed kindly by most of the international community. Yet, many US allies greeted news of Maduro's capture with some trepidation.

European Commission President Antonio Costa said he had “great concern” about the situation in Venezuela. “The EU has repeatedly stated that Mr Maduro lacks legitimacy and has defended a peaceful transition,” European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas added on X, “Under all circumstances, the principles of international law and the UN Charter must be respected. We call for restraint.”

The criticism from some Democrats over Trump's military action to oust Maduro was immediate. “This war is illegal, it's embarrassing that we went from the world cop to the world bully in less than one year.” Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona wrote on X, “There is no reason for us to be at war with Venezuela.”

Beyond rhetoric, what does Trump mean to achieve?

The operation was the culmination of a push inside the administration led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other like-minded foes of Maduro who have been urging Trump to take action against the Venezuelan leader for years dating back to Trump's first administration.

In Florida, a epicentre of the Venezuelan diaspora opposition, the operation was cheered as an era-changing moment.

Maduro had sought a pathway to exit from power, while saving face. Venezuelan government officials had floated a plan in which Maduro would eventually leave office, The Associated Press reported in October.

The proposal, which was rejected by the White House, called for Maduro to step down in three years and hand over to his vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, who would complete Maduro's six-year term that ends in January 2031. Rodriguez would not run for re-election under the plan.

But the White House had rejected the proposal because the administration questioned the legitimacy of Maduro's rule.

Maduro earlier this week also said Venezuela was open to negotiating an agreement with the US to combat drug trafficking and work with Washington on promoting US further investment in the Venezuelan oil industry.

Trump continued to insist that Maduro's days in power were numbered.

Shorty after Trump announced Maduro's capture, the White House posted video on one of its social media accounts of Trump in October explicitly telling reporters that Maduro was feeling pressure from the US campaign and trying to cut a deal. “He doesn't want to f*** around with the United States,” Trump said.

Elliot Abrams, who served as US special representative for Iran and Venezuela in the first Trump administration, said the president now must decide how invested his administration will be in shaping the next government in Caracas.

“I think the real question is whether Trump will claim victory and be satisfied with Delcy Rodriguez making some promises or engaging in negotiations," Abrams said. “Or will he insist on Gonzalez."

Trump in an appearance on Fox TV on Saturday morning said he wasn't ready to commit to a certain leader but pledged his administration would be “very involved” in Venezuela. “We can't take a chance of letting somebody else run it — just take over where (Maduro) left or left off,” Trump said.

But another geopolitical question looms: What lessons will America's adversaries take from Trump's decision, as China's Xi Jinping has vowed to annex the self-ruled island of Taiwan, and Russia's Vladimir Putin's continued his war in Ukraine?

(with AP and Bloomberg inputs)