- - US seizes Venezuelan leader, Trump says: Live updates

Kim Hjelmgaard, Cybele Mayes-Osterman, Davis Winkie and Phillip M. Bailey, USA TODAY January 3, 2026 at 1:53 AM

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The United States seized Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife in an overnight military operation on Jan. 3, President Donald Trump said, as U.S. airstrikes rocked Caracas and targets across the country.

The U.S. "successfully carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicolas Maduro, who has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the Country," Trump said in a post on Truth Social. "This operation was done in conjunction with U.S. Law Enforcement."

Images from Venezuela showed explosions, burning vehicles and plumes of smoke rising over the capital, Caracas, and other locations, as witnesses reported the sounds of low-flying jets.

The blasts came after a United States military buildup in the Caribbean, U.S. attacks on alleged drug boats, the seizure of Venezuelan oil tankers and threats by Trump against Maduro and his government.

Picture of fire at Fuerte Tiuna, Venezuela's largest military complex, after a series of explosions in Caracas on January 3, 2026. Loud explosions, accompanied by sounds resembling aircraft flyovers, were heard in Caracas around 2:00 am on January 3.

Venezuela's government declared a state of emergency and denounced what it called "extremely serious military aggression perpetrated by the current Government of the United States of America against Venezuelan territory and population."

Opposition says multiple military targets hit

A vehicle burns at La Carlota air base in Caracas after a series of explosions on Jan. 3, 2026. Loud explosions, accompanied by sounds resembling aircraft flyovers, were heard in Caracas around 2:00 am. The explosions come as President Donald Trump, who has deployed a navy task force to the Caribbean, raised the possibility of ground strikes against Venezuela.

David Smolansky, a spokesperson for Maria Corina Machado, the leader of the Venezuelan opposition, told USA TODAY that strikes carried out by the U.S. targeted several critical infrastructure and military facilities.

Those include Fuerte Tiuna, the main military base in Caracas, La Carlota, a military airbase, a site for signal antennae and communications infrastructure on a peak overlooking Caracas called El Volcán, and a port on the Caribbean coast called La Guaira.

-- Cybele Mayes-Ostema

US citizens in Venezuela should 'shelter in place,' leave: embassy

The Department of State acknowledged "reports of explosions in and around Caracas, Venezuela," in a post to the U.S. Embassy Venezuela website.

"U.S. citizens in Venezuela should shelter in place and depart immediately when it is safe to do so," said the post by the U.S. Embassy Colombia. (The American embassy in Caracas closed in 2019.)

The alert reiterated earlier travel guidance from Dec. 3 warning "all U.S. citizens in Venezuela ... to depart immediately."

– Davis Winkie

Attacks follow large US military buildup

1 / 4US forces seize oil tanker in raid off Venezuela coastU.S. forces abseil onto an oil tanker during a raid described by U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi as its seizure by the United States off the coast of Venezuela, Dec. 10, 2025, in a still image from video.

The overnight explosions follow a series of attacks by the U.S. military on alleged drug-trafficking vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific that began in early September. The campaign escalated to include the seizure of oil tankers coming and going from Venezuelan ports in late December.

A sizeable American flotilla has amassed in the southern Caribbean Sea, including multiple guided missile destroyers, a missile cruiser, and a Marine Corps amphibious ready group aboard Navy landing ships. The U.S. publicly moved the USS Gerald R. Ford – the world's largest aircraft carrier – into the region in recent months as well.

Just days before the apparent attack, President Donald Trump confirmed that the CIA conducted a land strike against a dock facility in the country.

More: Trump publicly touts CIA-led strikes that are normally kept quiet. Why?

A column of smoke rises during multiple explosions in the early hours of the morning, in Caracas, Venezuela, January 3, 2026 in this screen grab obtained from video obtained by Reuters.

The administration has attacked at least 35 boats traversing international waters, killing at least 115 people − many of them Venezuelans. Trump and other officials have defended the boat strikes as an attempt to stop illegal narcotics, specifically fentanyl, from flooding into the country.

"The Biden administration preferred the kid gloves approach, allowing millions of people — including dangerous cartels and unvetted Afghans — to flood our communities with drugs and violence," Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a Nov. 29 post on X, when he lashed out at a report that he ordered U.S. military officials to leave no survivors during one of the Caribbean sea strikes.

Senator calls attacks a 'stupid adventure'

Lawmakers from both parties have criticized the Trump administration's military attacks for providing no intelligence briefings or other evidence about what the vessels are carrying. Some members of Congress, former military officials and legal analysts have said the strikes are illegal and amount to extrajudicial killings that violate international human rights law.

#COMUNICADO | La República Bolivariana de #Venezuela🇻🇪 rechaza, repudia y denuncia ante la comunidad internacional la gravísima agresión militar perpetrada por el Gobierno actual de los Estados Unidos de América contra territorio y población venezolanos en las localidades civiles… pic.twitter.com/x316Fzme5K

— teleSUR TV (@teleSURtv) January 3, 2026

Some of those lawmakers also criticized Saturday's strikes and the administration's silence in their immediate wake.

"We have no vital national interests in Venezuela to justify war," said Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, on X. "We should have learned not to stumble into another stupid adventure by now. And he’s not even bothering to tell the American public what the hell is going on."

Trump has described Maduro, who has been in power since 2013 after the death of populist Hugo Chávez, as running Venezuela like a "narco-terrorist" drug cartel that is directly responsible for American deaths.

The Federal Aviation Administration issued a notice banning commercial aircraft from operating in Venezuelan airspace around 1 a.m. ET on Jan. 3.

Contributing: Reuters

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