Tangle - The U.S. captures Maduro.

Episode Date: January 5, 2026

Early Saturday morning, the United States military conducted air strikes in Venezuela and carried out an operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Shortly thereafter, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, had been indicted in the Southern District of New York and charged with “Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States.” In a press conference later in the day, President Donald Trump said that the United States will assume control of Venezuela “until such time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition.” Ad-free podcasts are here!To listen to this podcast ad-free, and to enjoy our subscriber only premium content, go to ReadTangle.com to sign up!You can read today's podcast⁠ ⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠, our “Under the Radar” story ⁠here and today’s “Have a nice day” story ⁠here⁠.You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here. Take the survey: What do you think of the U.S. operation in Venezuela? Let us know.Our Executive Editor and Founder is Isaac Saul. Our Executive Producer is Jon Lall.This podcast was written by: Isaac Saul and edited and engineered by Dewey Thomas. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75.Our newsletter is edited by Managing Editor Ari Weitzman, Senior Editor Will Kaback, Lindsey Knuth, Bailey Saul, and Audrey Moorehead. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle podcast, the place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. I'm your host, Isaac Sahl. and we are back from New Year's break, and it's a new world. Today, we are going to be covering the capture and arrest of Nicholas Maduro, Venezuela's former president now, I suppose. It is a crazy story. I'm still processing a lot of the information we have coming out,

but I'm going to share what we know. We're going to share some views from the left and the right. We're going to catch you up on some of the news that you miss. and then we're going to jump in with views from the left and the right and, of course, my take and also today some views from abroad. Before we do that, I do want to give a quick heads up that applications are now open for our college ambassador program. Tangle ambassadors represent Tangle's mission of bridging partisan divides on their campuses,

spearheading creative outreach efforts to engage their fellow students. We have paid positions requiring two to four hours of work. during the week in the spring, 2026th semester. The applications for college ambassadors and for college students are open from Monday, January 5th to Monday, January 12th at 1159 p.m. Eastern. If you or someone you know is interested, you can submit an application with a link in today's episode description or our newsletter, or you can email our senior editor, Will K-Back. That's Will W-I-L at readtangle.com with any questions.

All right, with that, I'm going to send it over to John for some stories we missed over break and today's main topic, and I'll be back for my take. Thanks, Isaac, and welcome, everybody. It is a brand new year, 26. I cannot believe it is 2026. I hope that you all had some good time off, time to rest and get refreshed and set up some good goals for yourself for this year. I know it's kind of a cliche in a trip to, you know, set up goals for the new year.

And a lot of people crash out way before they even accomplish them. But, you know, we've got a whole community here. Maybe we can find ways to support each other through the year. So what are some of your goals for this year? And how do you plan to hold yourself accountable to get them done, to see them through? I'd love to hear from you. Reach out to me, John at readtangle.com. That's J-O-N-Ridtangle.com.

I'd love to keep up with you all through the year and hear what's going on in your lives and there's more to talk about on our end as well. So with that said, let's remember to bring the best of ourselves to everything that we do in the hopes of spreading some positivity to those around us.

We have a lot to round up from the last week. So I'm going to get into some of the stories that we missed. Obviously, the biggest story over the past five days has been the U.S. Operation to Capture Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro which we are covering as our main story today. However, as we typically do after a few days off, we wanted to briefly recap the other major stories that we missed.

On Tuesday, Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services Jim O'Neill announced HHS froze hundreds of millions of dollars in child care funding for Minnesota in response to allegations of widespread fraud in child care centers run by members of the state's Somali community. The next day, a spokesperson for HHS said that no funds had been frozen, instead reporting that requirements were tightened across the country. Homeland Security Secretary Christy Knoem also said that federal officials were investigating the allegations.

On Wednesday, President Trump announced that he would end the current National Guard deployments to Chicago, Los Angeles, and Portland, Oregon, though he suggested he could mobilize the guard again in the future. The announcement followed a Supreme Court decision to uphold a lower court order blocking the Chicago deployment. Separately, the House Judiciary Committee released the transcript of former Special Counsel. Jack Smith's testimony on his investigations into President Trump earlier in December. Smith said his team had amassed evidence that proved beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results of the 2020 election and to prevent the lawful transition of power. On Thursday, New Year's Day, at least 40 people were killed

and 115 injured in Switzerland when a fire broke out during New Year's celebrations at a bar in a ski resort town. Separately, enhanced Affordable Care Act tax subsidies expired, and new restrictions for beneficiaries of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program went into effect in five states. In New York City, Zora Mamdani was sworn in as mayor, the city's first of South Asian descent, and the youngest since the 19th century. And on Friday, the Justice Department said that federal authorities had stopped a planned New Year's Eve terror attack by a North Carolina man, who was charged with providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization. In Iran, major protests broke out over rise in costs

and human rights groups said that at least 16 people have been killed in clashes with security forces. President Trump said that the U.S. is locked and loaded and ready to support the protesters if the Iranian government violently kills them. All right, that is it for the stories that we missed from last week. And now for today's quick hits. First up, Minnesota Governor Tim Walls announced he will not run for re-election in 2026, saying he would spend the remainder of his term working to address ongoing fraud cases in the state. Walls has come under scrutiny for his handling of the schemes, which prosecutors say defrauded the state of billions of dollars. Number two, President Donald Trump said that U.S. officials have concluded that Ukraine

did not target Russian President Vladimir Putin's residence in a drone attack, contrary to Russian officials' claims. Number three, French and British forces conducted a joint strike against a suspected weapons storage facility in Syria used by the Islamic State. Number four, a group of federal workers filed a class action complaint against the Trump administration over its new policy to end coverage for gender transition care in federal health insurance programs. The complaint alleges the policy discriminates on the basis of sex. And number five, North Korea launched multiple ballistic missiles towards the country's eastern

waters hours before South Korean President Li Jiameng flew to China to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said that the launches did not appear to pose an immediate threat to U.S. personnel or territory or to our allies. In Caracas, Venezuela, U.S. Delta Forces slipped into the home of dictator Nicholas Maduro. By 3.30 a.m., he and his wife were an American custom. He was trying to get into a safe place. You know, the safe place is all steel, and he wasn't able to make it to the door because our guys were so fast. Officials tell CBS News that a CIA source inside the Maduro government had tracked the dictator's movements for months. Early Saturday morning, the United States military conducted airstrikes in Venezuela and carried out an operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Shortly thereafter, the Department of Justice announced. that Maduro and his wife, Celia Flores, had been indicted in the Southern District of New York and charged with narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices against the United States.

In a press conference later in the day, President Donald Trump said that the United States will assume control of Venezuela until such a time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition. Maduro served as Venezuela's president for over a decade, during which the country suffered economic hardship, hyperinflation, and public unrest. In 2024, Maduro claimed victory in Venezuela's presidential election,

despite substantial evidence that he had lost to opposition candidate Edmondo Gonzalez. The United States and many other countries do not recognize Maduro as the democratically elected leader of Venezuela. In 2020, the Southern District of New York charged Maduro with narco-terrorism, and the U.S. government raised the reward for information leading to his arrest and or conviction to $50 million in August. We previously covered the Venezuelan election, and you can check that out with a link in today's episode description. In recent months, the second Trump administration escalated action against the Maduro government,

alleging that the Venezuelan leader leads a drug trafficking network called the Cartel de los Soles that is importing substantial amounts of cocaine into the U.S. President Trump has authorized frequent military strikes in the waters near Venezuela against boats allegedly trafficking drugs. And in December, the Central Intelligence Agency struck a port facility on the coast. of Venezuela, believed to be used by the Tren de Eragua gang to store and traffic drugs. According to General Dan Kane, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, President Trump authorized mission late Friday night, and it was carried out as a joint

operation involving more than 150 aircraft launched from 20 different land and sea bases across the Western Hemisphere. Maduro and his wife were captured and extracted without resistance. No U.S. troops were killed, though one helicopter was struck by gunfire, and approximately six soldiers were injured. Venezuelan officials said that at least 80 people, including both military personnel and civilians, were killed in the attack. On Saturday, Maduro's vice president, Delci Rodriguez, was sworn in as interim president and decried the U.S. operation, calling for Maduro to be returned to Venezuela.

However, President Trump told reporters that Rodriguez had indicated her willingness to cooperate with the U.S. Also in the press conference, Trump announced a broad plan for the U.S. to run Venezuela for an interim period. The president did not specify who would be in charge or for how long, but he said, added that we're not afraid of boots on the ground, and U.S. oil companies will soon move in and start making money for the country. On Saturday, Rubio said that the administration would establish a military quarantine on the country's oil exports in lieu of the U.S. directly managing Venezuelan affairs. Later in the day, however, Trump reasserted that the U.S. was in charge. On Sunday, the president also suggested that the U.S. could take military action against other

countries in the Western Hemisphere, such as Cuba, Colombia, and Greenland. This week, the Senate will vote on a war powers resolution that would block President Trump from continuing military action against Venezuela. The measure is a privileged resolution, meaning it requires only a simple majority to pass. Today, we'll share responses to the U.S. attack from the right, left, and Venezuelan writers, and then Isaac's take. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right. First up, let's start with what the right is saying. The right mostly supports the operation, praising Trump for decisive action to remove Maduro.

Others say historical precedent justified U.S. action. The Washington Examiner editorial board called it a welcome end to the Maduro regime. President Donald Trump took decisive and justified action this morning, launching precision military strikes in Venezuela that enabled special forces to seize and detain dictator Nicolas Maduro, the board route. Maduro was an illegitimate leader, despised by his own people who, like Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega 40 years ago, was running a vast drug trafficking operation that was doing immediate and direct harm to the U.S. Like Noriega, Maduro will now be tried in a court of law for his crimes and the entire

Western Hemisphere is now safer with him in custody. The decision to bring Maduro to justice is not an isolated event and should be instead processed in the larger context of the Trump administration's recently released National Security Strategy, which promised a Trump corollary to the Monroe Doctrine that would protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region, the board said. Removing Maduro dismantles a criminal regime, blocks Chinese expansion, and reasserts U.S. result to defend democratic sovereignty close to home. This is what strategic realism looks like. In Fox News, Jonathan Turley argued the capture of Maduro did not require approval from Congress. Presidents, including Democratic presidents, have launched lethal

attacks regularly against individuals. President Barack Obama killed an American citizen under this kill-list policy. If Obama can vaporize an American citizen without even a criminal charge, Trump can capture a foreign citizen with a pending criminal indictment without prior congressional approval, Turley wrote. Former Panamanian leader Manuel Antonio Noriega argued that his arrest in 1989, violated international law under the Head of State Immunity Doctrine. The district court rejected Noriega's head of state immunity claim because the United States government never recognized Noriega as Panama's legitimate ruler, an argument that will be made in the Maduro prosecution. This action not only confronted Venezuela, but also Cuba,

which was supplying the security around Maduro. Presumably, Cuban security may have been involved in the firefight. While cutting off vital oil to Cuba, the Trump administration just delivered a blow against the Cuban regime, arguably one of the most stinging defeat since crushing the Cuban forces in Grenada in 1983, Turley wrote. Maduro will replay the arguments from the Noriega case. However, he presents an even weaker case on the merits under the controlling precedent than did Noriega. All right, that is it for what the right is saying, which brings us to what the left is saying. The left opposes the operation, arguing it was illegal and will not advance U.S. interests.

Others say he continues the United States' long history of ill-advised imperialism. The New York Times editorial board called the attack illegal and unwise. Few people will feel any sympathy for Mr. Maduro. He is undemocratic and repressive and has destabilized the Western Hemisphere in recent years. The United Nations recently issued a report detailing more than a decade of killings, torture, sexual violence, and arbitration detention by henchmen against his political opponents. He stole Venezuela's presidential election in 2024, the board wrote. If there is an overriding lesson of American foreign affairs in the past century, however, it is that attempting to oust even the most deplorable regime

can make matters worse. Mr. Trump has not yet offered a coherent explanation for his actions in Venezuela. He is pushing our country toward an international crisis without valid reasons. If Mr. Trump wants to argue otherwise, the Constitution spells out what he must do. Go to Congress. Without congressional approval, his actions violate U.S. law, the board said. By proceeding without any semblance of international legitimacy, valid legal authority, or domestic endorsement, Mr. Trump risks providing justification for authoritarians in China, Russia, and elsewhere, who want to dominate their own neighborhoods. More immediately, he threatens to replicate the American hubris that led to the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

In common dreams, Kevin Martin wrote, no one voted for Trump's attack on Venezuela. Bogus assertions that Venezuela stole U.S. oil raise suspicions that this is not about narcotics trafficking, but rather seizing resources such as oil and minerals. Moreover, other countries in the region are surely on high alert that they might be next in President Donald Trump's crosshairs and U.S. forces deployed worldwide could be targeted for reprisals, Martin said.

Trump just announced, we are going to run the country until such a time as we can do a safe, proper judicious transition. No one voted for that, nor has Congress authorized it on behalf of the American people. In less than a year in office, Trump has now attacked seven countries, Somalia, Iran, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Nigeria, and Venezuela, along with alleged drugboats at sea, with at least 626 airstrikes, according to military times. So much for being a peace precedent or focusing on improving economic and social conditions for Americans, Martin wrote. The United States history of lawless imperialism in the Western Hemisphere and beyond cannot be overstated or discounted. An international condemnation of this episode will presumably be strong and sustained.

It is up to Congress and the American public to reign in a lawless executive branch intent on concocting distractions from the Epstein files, the anniversary of the January 6th insurrection, and the miserably failed policies of the Trump administration. All right, that is up for what the right and the left are saying, which brings us to what Venezuelan writers are saying. Most Venezuelan writers welcome Maduro's ouster, but say the country's future is still uncertain.

Others say the challenges of rebuilding will be immense. The El Nacional editorial board wrote about the end of Maduro. It was a surgical operation completed in just over a couple of hours that laid bare the regime's inability not only to respond, but to even detect an action against a central figure of the Venezuelan dictatorship, the board said. The decisive operation against Maduro is the consequence, of the military deployment announced by Trump in mid-August of last year.

Yesterday's outcome is proof that talks with regime leaders for his negotiated departure from power have collapsed. It is hoped that the coming hours and days will clarify the situation facing Venezuelans. It is an unfolding story in which Maduro was removed from the country and by nightfall was in the hands of American justice, the board wrote. The aspiration of Venezuelans, who yesterday expressed their jubilation in different parts of the world over the fall of Maduro, is for the recognition of the election results of July 28. the beginning of a process of democratic, social, and economic recovery,

the freeing of political prisoners, and the gradual re-institutionalization of the country's public life. In the New York Times, Colet Capriles explored what Venezuelans really want. For Venezuelans, our situation will not be fixed by Mr. Maduro's departure, let alone by a foreign occupying force. We are not a nation held together by a government or social contract, but a collection of individuals trapped in a struggle for survival. replacing the man at the top will not dismantle the web of bosses, private loyalties, corrupt practices,

and institutional ruins that have replaced public life here, Capriela said. Of course, Venezuelans want change. We said as much in the 2024 elections, in which tallies gathered by thousands of volunteers showed an overwhelming opposition victory. For many, the demand for change is not ideological or limited to new leadership. Venezuelans want change in their quality of life. Mr. Trump has not said how the United States will be. begin to run Venezuela or when it will stop.

Whatever is to come, the system that Mr. Maduro has overseen can't be dismantled overnight. His followers, long-standing chavistas, or armed opportunists, could very well mount a prolonged insurgency, the type of war in which the population is held hostage, regardless of political preferences, Capriela said. It is very easy to create chaos and make a country ungovernable when the former institutions are already broken. No matter who is in power, the path to healing the anxiety, distrust, and isolation. that have flourished over the past decade is not clear.

All right, let's head over to Isaac for his take. All right, that is it for it with the left and the right and some writers from our broader saying, which brings us to my take. We woke up to a new world this week, and it's still hard to process the whole story and it has more angles than I could ever cover in a single podcast. But I'm going to try to get to everything I can today. So here are 14 thoughts on the capture and arrest of Nicholas Maduro. Number one, Maduro was an unequivocally repressive dictator.

The moment after he, quote-unquote, won Venezuela's 2024 election, offered a chance to force him out of power by leveraging an audit of the actual election results against him. and I hoped then that a broad coalition of international leaders would do just that. They or we didn't. I want fewer rulers like Maduro in the world, and based on the widely reported real election results, most Venezuelans don't want him in power either.

I'll shed precisely zero tears for his arrest, and I hope a new leader brings forward a new set of values and a new vision for the Venezuelan people. But that future does not at all seem assured to me. Number two, this should be the final nail in the coffin for any notion of a Trump doctrine on foreign policy. There is no Trump doctrine. For nearly 10 years, American pundits have been trying to decipher one

to make sense of Donald the Dove, who's also a strong man, who is also a Nobel Peace Prize candidate, who is also a warmonger, who is also a non-interventionist. Some see a powerful leader restoring American strength on the global stage. Others see an anti-establishment antithesis to George W. Bush, who is done dragging Americans into foreign wars. Part of Trump's brilliance is this incoherence. It's that in part he is all of these things, which allows American voters to see whatever they want in him. It also really complicates the message for his most sycophantic supporters. It leaves them saying things like, I'm as reflexively non-interventionist as anyone can possibly be, and I want America to rule over.

over this hemisphere and exert its power for the good of our people, which is something Matt Walsh said in a single tweet this week. Number three, Trump's foreign policy is guided by very few consistent principles, but a premium on personal relationships is one of them. This story provides two examples. Number one, Trump just pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez, the former president of Honduras, who was tried and convicted for his role in one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking operations in the world. But Trump saw himself in Hernandez, who he thinks was unfairly prosecuted,

so he set him free. Number two, the Washington Post is reporting that Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corino Machado would be president right now if she had turned down 2025's Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump ardently sought. The report was based on two anonymous sources, so I wouldn't stake my credibility on its legitimacy. But it's completely plausible, given and the other examples we have of how personal slights and relationships often drive Trump's decision-making. See also Zelensky, Putin, Bukkele, Kim, Shinebaum, Netanyahu, Ben-Salman, etc. Number four, though Maduro's overnight capture and extradition was shocking because of the spectacle of it all, it shouldn't have come as a surprise. I've been predicting for months in our newsletter,

on the podcast, on our YouTube channel, that a land strike and a war were coming with Venezuela, and that the only off-ramp was Maduro stepping down, which he did not seem keen to do. I'm not happy to be right about those predictions, but they weren't particularly hard to make. The administration wasn't being shy. The question now is whether these strikes, this quote-unquote war, lasted for two hours and killed 80 people, or if we are in the beginning of a protracted conflict. Number five, I'm spending some time this month at my property in West Texas, where I'm recording this podcast right now, and it's one of the most remote,

places in the country where my neighbors spend more time working their various trades than following the news. Yet the capture of Maduro has broken through, even here. Family and friends talk about it over meals. It comes up almost everywhere I go. Since I'm the quote-unquote news guy, I inevitably field questions about it when I run into friends. The most common one I'm getting right now is why? Why did we do this? And that's hard to answer. Number six, in the administration's telling, we took Maduro out because he is a drug kingpin who is killing Americans. But also, we took him out because Venezuela stole our oil, and now we're taking it back. But also, it's to keep China or Russia or Iran out of the Western Hemisphere.

But also, maybe it's to put everyone else on notice, to let leaders in Cuba and Colombia and also China and Iran know that Trump is just that crazy and they ought to respect it. Or maybe all of this was just to support democracy, and our motivations were really the future prospects of the Venezuelan. people. Again, here, it'd be nice to know what the administration thinks, but deciphering it is impossible. Number seven, if I were steelmanning for the administration, I'd argue simply that it's all of the above. All of this, the fight against drug smuggling, the message to China and Russia, the removal

of a repressive dictator, the possibility of democracy and the upside of controlling the oil together made such an extreme action worth the risk. That's an argument. I could chew on for a bit, but it's not the one the administration is offering. And if it is, they aren't articulating it clearly or consistently. Number eight, alternatively, maybe Trump just knew he could pull this off. The domestic politics work, Maduro is properly loathed by many Latinos residing in the United States, and perhaps enough people in Trump's orbit thought an overt demonstration of American power in the global South justified the military risk.

By all accounts, the military operation was a resounding success, pending more clarity about the accuracy and identity of the reported 80 people killed. In and out, over quickly, Maduro brought back to the U.S. alive and without any American soldiers killed. For some people, that might be most of what matters. Certainly, it reflects extremely well on our military capability. For me, though, the question of, are we capable of removing Maduro was never really a question. The question is now what? And this is another question the administration does not seem to have a clear answer for. Number 10.

The account from U.S. officials is of a curiously perfect military operation. Spies fed reliable information to a special operations force that took out power in Caracas and then descended on Maduro's home, capturing him alive before he could lock himself inside a safe room. The troops' maneuvers were all aided by rehearsals and a life-size model of Maduro's fortress. Without being too conspiratorial, I think such a seamless operation invites reasonable questions about whether behind-the-scenes negotiating took place, either with Maduro or the people around him. History suggests that if any back-channeling occurred, we'll learn more about it in the next six months to 50 years.

But for now, we know only what we know, and it looks like a remarkable tactical success. Number 11. Tactically, things going well is not proof positive that they're not. this move was smart or worth the risk. We found out after the fact that plans leaked to major newspapers which didn't print the story per long-held journalistic practices not to share information that could risk the lives of American soldiers. Even if Maduro or some members of top brass struck a behind-the-scenes deal to cooperate, the operation still carried significant risk.

And the fact that the first stage of this operation was successful does not guarantee that we've avoided a worst-case scenario in the long run. Number 12. Trump says we're going to run the country for a bit, whatever that means, and that we're not afraid of boots on the ground. He might want to check with the American people on that one. Vice President Delci Rodriguez, now sworn in as president, has been recognized by the Venezuelan armed forces, and Trump says she has no choice but to cooperate. Yet her public statements so far are a mix of defiant and pliant, and her background does not read like someone who will roll over for U.S. interests. I'm not at all clear.

what her next moves are. At the same time, the administration suggests we're either getting ready to rebuild the country's oil infrastructure and administer elections, Trump's definition of running the country, or we'll just keep applying pressure on Venezuela with sanctions and pushing it in the direction we want, Secretary of State Marco Rubio's definition of running the country. There is a very obvious tension between the administration's anti-communist rhetoric and its apparent belief it can centrally plan another nation from afar. Number 13. If you made me bet all my personal belongings on the administration's true motivations here, cynically, I'd bet the answer is oil. Venezuela is rich with the kind of oil we can refine in the United States. Iran, Russia, and China were already making inroads, as one Venezuelan celebrating in the streets put it,

what do you think Russian China wanted the recipe for Arapas? Trump has been talking more and more about the need to take back oil refineries he thinks Venezuela stole. This has, for what it's worth, also been the allegation from Venezuela, that the Trump administration was coming for its natural resources. It's remarkable, in the most dispiriting way possible, to imagine that in 2026, the United States is still risking wars to protect and pursue its own oil interests, that Trump explicitly campaigned on non-intervention for so long, and now just says it out loud, is only salt and wound.

Number 14. I have to ask, Who wants this? Genuinely, if any tangible cost accumulates here, I suspect it is going to become a huge problem for the Trump administration politically. Just two months ago, the director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, declared the United States strategy of regime change over.

Democratic lawmakers say that Marco Rubio and Pete Hegeset told them explicitly that they were not pursuing regime change in Venezuela. Whether you think this mission was unconstitutional or legally in bounds with an unrestrained executive branch or simply a violation of international law, it certainly feels illegal and immoral. More instability in Venezuela could also mean more Venezuelan migrants, which means more Venezuelan refugees arriving at the U.S. border,

this time as a direct result of our own actions. If you pluck an American off the street and ask them about the prospects of kidnapping Venezuela's president and running the country for a bit, what percentage of people are going to express support? 2%? 5%? After running the campaign Trump ran, I have no idea how he sales any of this to the American public. Successful mission or not,

I for one, have zero desire to see what's at the end of the road we just got on. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right, that is it for my take today. We're skipping our reader question because we've got a jam-packed podcast catching up on the news we missed. But I'm going to send it back to John for the rest of the show. And I'll see you guys tomorrow. Happy New Year and have a good one. Peace.

Thanks, Isaac. Here's your under the radar story for today, folks. In October, the Trump administration announced a 25% tariff on upholstered furniture, kitchen cabinets, and vanities that were set to increase to between 30% and 50% at the start of 2026. However, on December 31st, the White House said the elevated tariffs would be delayed at least one year. According to a White House fact sheet, the pause reflects productive negotiations with trade partners on wood imports, though the base 25% tariff will remain in effect.

While the administration says the tariffs are intended to bolster American industry, furniture prices have increased since they were implemented, with prices for kitchen and dining room furniture rising 4.6% in November, compared to the tax. to the year prior. ABC News has this story, and there's a link in today's episode description. Well, folks, we've heard over and over from people that the numbers section doesn't seem to translate too well for people on the podcast side. So we're going to do a little experiment and take the number section out of the podcast, at least for a little bit, and see what the response is from people, whether or not that works out better for them in the flow of the podcast.

If you feel strongly one way or the other, please write into me, John at reetangle.com. That's J-O-N at readtangle.com. And last but not least, our Have a Nice Day story. On the slopes of Italy's Mount Jidefalco, one rural village experienced a 30-year-first in March, the birth of a child. The baby, named Lara, has become a symbol of hope for a town that has undergone drastic depopulation in recent years, and for a country with a fertility rate. measured at 1.18 in 2024, one of the lowest in the European Union.

People who didn't even know that Pagliara daimarcy existed have come only because they heard about Lara, the baby's mother, Cynthia Trubuco said. At just nine months old, she's famous. The Guardian has this story, and there's a link in today's episode description. All right, everybody, that is it for today's episode. As always, if you'd like to support our work, please go to retangle.com, where you can send up for a newsletter membership, podcast membership, or a bundled membership that gets who a discount on both. We'll be right back here tomorrow. For Isaac and the rest of the crew, this is John Law, signing all.

Have a great day, y'all. Peace. Our executive editor and founder is me. Isaac Saul, and our executive producer is John Wall. Today's episode was edited and engineered by Dewey Thomas. Our editorial staff is led by managing editor Ari Weitzman with senior editor Will Kayback and associate editors Audrey Moorhead, Lindsay Canuth, and Bailey Saul.

Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75. To learn more about Tangle and to sign up for a membership, please visit our website at reetangle.com.