President Trump levied a barrage of new threats against various countries following the U.S. operation capturing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro over the weekend.
Trump was not shy when asked about what the strike on Venezuela meant for other countries in the region, including Cuba and Colombia, during his trip back to Washington from Florida on Sunday.
“Colombia is very sick, too. Run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States, and he’s not going to be doing it very long,” the president said, referring to Colombian President Gustavo Petro.
When asked by NewsNation’s Libbey Dean whether the U.S. would embark on a military operation against Colombia, Trump replied “it sounds good to me.”
Trump also issued a stark warning to Mexico to “get their act together,” citing drug cartels in the country.
“You have to do something with Mexico,” Trump said. “We’re going to have to do something. We’d love Mexico to do it, they’re capable of doing it, but unfortunately the cartels are very strong in Mexico.”
He noted he has offered to send U.S. assistance to Mexico in an effort to combat the cartels.
The president also targeted Cuba in his remarks to reporters, highlighting the communist country’s economic situation.
“Cuba is ready to fall. Cuba looks like it’s ready to fall. I don’t know if they’re going to hold out,” the president told reporters. “But Cuba now has no income. They got all of their income from Venezuela, from the Venezuelan oil. They’re not getting any of it. Cuba is literally read to fall, and you have a lot of great Cuban Americans who are going to be happy about this.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who was traveling with Trump, separately noted Cuba’s days “are numbered.”
“We’re going to wake up one day, hopefully in ‘26, and in our backyard we’re going to have allies in these countries doing business with America, not narcoterrorist dictators killing Americans,” Graham said.
Trump’s remarks were not only limited to countries in Latin America, but also to the north in Greenland. The president re-upped his calls for the U.S. to annex the Danish territory.
“We need Greenland, from the standpoint of national security,” Trump said.
Trump also turned his sights east to Iran, which has been grappling with widespread protests in recent days.
“If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the United States,” Trump said, referring to the regime’s handling of the protests.
Trump sent shock waves throughout the world in the early hours of Saturday when the U.S. carried out a mission to capture Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores from Caracas.
While he has received praise from Republicans and Latin American communities in the U.S., he has faced pushback from other countries, including Mexico and Colombia.
“The history of Latin America is clear and compelling: Intervention has never brought democracy,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told reporters Monday, noting Mexico’s sovereignty is sacred.
Petro hit back at Trump’s threats in a lengthy social media post, reasserting his role as “the supreme commander of the military and police forces of Colombia by constitutional order.”
As for Trump’s latest remarks on Greenland, Denmark and the territory’s leadership have pushed back on the president.
According to the BBC, Greenland Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen called the notion of the U.S. taking over the territory as a “fantasy.”
“No more pressure. No more insinuations. No more fantasies of annexation. We are open to dialogue. We are open to discussions. But this must happen through the proper channels and with respect for international law,” Nielsen said.