The President's Daily Brief - PDB Afternoon Bulletin | December 18th, 2025: Venezuela Sends Warships to Challenge U.S. Naval Blockade & Colombia Cartel Labeled Terrorists

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

In this episode of The PDB Afternoon Bulletin: Tensions are climbing in the Caribbean as Venezuela orders its navy to escort oil tankers in response to the U.S. blockade, raising the risk of a direct showdown with American warships and pushing both sides further up the escalation ladder. The U.S. designates Colombia’s Clan del Golfo cartel as a terrorist organization, a major shift that could open the door to expanded military and counterterror operations against one of the region’s most violent criminal groups. To listen to the show ad-free, become a premium member of The President’s Daily Brief by visiting https://PDBPremium.com. Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of The President's Daily Brief. YouTube: youtube.com/@presidentsdailybrief Debt Relief Advocates: Learn what debt reduction you may qualify for. Go online and visit https://DRA.com/podcast  Birch Gold: Text PDB to 989898 and get your free info kit on gold Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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organization, a move that could open the door to expanded military action against the group. But first, today's afternoon spotlight. As we covered yesterday here on the PDB, President Trump announced a naval blockade targeting U.S. sanctioned Venezuelan oil tankers. It's a move designed to cut off a major source of revenue, of course, for the Maduro regime. Now today, well, we're seeing Caracas respond. President Nicholas Maduro has ordered Venezuelan naval vessels to escort oil tankers as they leave Venezuelan ports and move through surrounding waters. On its face, well, that sounds like a direct challenge to the U.S. blockade, and it's certainly meant to look that way. But here's the key detail that matters right now. None of the tankers being escorted so far

are on the U.S. sanctions list. That distinction is important because at least for the moment, this move remains largely symbolic. Maduro is signaling defiance without actually crossing the line that would force a U.S. response. He's climbing the escalation ladder, so to speak, but he hasn't reached the wrong where things could get ugly, primarily for him. Still, this move matters because once you introduce naval escorts, of course, you change the character of the situation. What had been a sanctions enforcement operation now includes state military forces operating in close proximity, and that's, of course, where the risk starts to creep in. Think of it this way.

An unescorted tanker can be stopped, boarded, or diverted with relatively little drama, just like we saw last week with the seizure of the skipper. A tanker escorted by armed naval vessels, well, that's a different equation. If Venezuelan warships continue escorting non-sanction tankers, while the U.S. can largely just observe and shadow and document, sending a message without triggering a confrontation, and that keeps things basically contained. But if Caracas decides to up the ante,

If a sanctioned tanker leaves port underarmed Venezuelan escort, well, we've got a new ballgame. At that point, U.S. forces obviously face a hard choice. Do they enforce the blockade and risk a direct naval confrontation, or do they allow a sanctioned vessel to pass, undermining the credibility of the entire operation? It's not a theoretical problem, of course. It's a scenario that commanders obviously think through long before ships ever meet at sea. Now, from Maduro's perspective, this move makes sense politically. He gets to portray the blockade as foreign aggression. He gets to show strength to his domestic audience, and he gets headlines that suggest he's standing up to Washington. In other words, he's trying to extract maximum political value while minimizing risk. So, you ask, what happens next? Well, I'm glad you asked. No surprise, that part isn't entirely clear. But new reporting gives us a better sense of how Washington is thinking about this. According to current and former Navy officials, U.S. warships in the Caribbean have already been shadowing

sanctioned oil tankers in international waters as they approach Venezuela. The idea is deterrence, make it clear those ships are being watched, apply pressure, and ideally convince their captains to turn around before anything escalates. But if that deterrence fails, U.S. commanders obviously have a few different options. One approach is to treat it as a law enforcement operation. That would involve identifying sanctioned vessels, securing legal warrants, and then seizing the ships in coordination with other agencies, similar to what we saw with the earlier seizure of the skipper. That would involve armed boarding teams deployed by helicopter from nearby warships, of course, those kind of operations are already high risk, but they become even more complicated if

Venezuelan naval vessels are escorting those tankers. There's also another possibility being discussed behind the scenes. American officials say another option could involve disabling a tanker's propulsion system, preventing it from moving, without boarding it outright. That would require extremely careful execution, both to avoid casualties and to prevent a major oil spill. Basically, we are in uncharted waters here as we approached the end of 2025. What started in the Caribbean as a counter-narcotics operation morphed into a large-scale military deployment to the region, and now a naval blockade, with President Trump announcing via social media that the U.S. wouldn't let up pressure until Venezuela returns the oil and land that it stole from the U.S., making it appear that this is

all about natural resources. Clearly, the White House is multitasking, combating narco-traffickers, seizing unblockading sanctioned oil tankers, exerting pressure on Venezuela's only real revenue stream, and trying to push Maduro out of power. Hmm, it's quite the holiday season. Coming up next, Washington takes a major step against Colombia's Klandagolfo cartel, designating the group as terrorists and potentially paving the way for military action.

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Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak And get your trip right Kayak, got that right Welcome back to the afternoon bulletin. The Trump administration's campaign against Latin American drug networks is widening. After first targeting Venezuela narco terrorists earlier this year, the White House is turning to Colombia, designating the Klan de Gulfo cartel, a foreign terrorist organization, potentially expanding U.S. military action. This is how Washington put it. The State Department this week described Klan de Golfo as a, quote, violent and powerful criminal

organization, pointing to its economic reliance on cocaine trafficking and along history of attacks against public officials, law enforcement, military personnel, and civilians inside Colombia. Beyond the symbolism, the designation tightens financial pressure and places the group squarely within a legal framework that the U.S. has increasingly relied on to confront transnational threats more aggressively under President Trump. If that framing sounds familiar, well, that's precisely the point. As you know in February, the Trump administration applied the same terrorist label to Venezuela's Trenda-Aragua and back in the country. November, Cartel de Los Soles. That opened the door for the ongoing U.S. military campaign,

targeting drug smuggling boats operating off Venezuela's coast. The Colombian cartel now finds itself in the spotlight, and possibly in the crosshairs. For background, Klan de Golfo, also known as AGC, is believed to have roughly 9,000 fighters, making it one of the South American country's most powerful armed groups. The organization traces its roots to paramilitary squads that fought Marxist guerrillas during Colombia's internal conflict in the 1990s and 2000s, before morphing into a sprawling criminal enterprise deeply embedded in the cocaine trade. And its reach is extensive. According to Colombia's human rights defenders' office, the cartel operates in roughly one-third

of the country's some 1,100 municipalities, extorting businesses and a variety of other activities, including recruiting children to carry out its smuggling operations. At one time, the Colombian government says the group offered cash bounties for, quote, dead police officers, a detail that underscores how openly the cartel challenges the Colombian state. And in 2022, AGC demonstrated just how much leverage it holds, shutting down dozens of towns in northern Colombia for several days after its leader was extradited to the U.S. But Bogota has attempted to fight back with the country's security forces intensifying operations against the cartel over the past year,

capturing more than 200 members and killing fighters, including senior figures. Yet, despite those efforts, violence persists, and frustration in Washington has continued to mount. That frustration has increasingly centered on Colombia's leftist president, Gustavo Petro. When we first discussed Pedro back in September, the Trump administration listed Colombia's leadership

as failing to cooperate in the drug war for the first time in nearly three decades, in what was a striking rebuke of a longtime U.S. ally that reflected a surge in cocaine production from Colombia. The pressure from Washington escalated further in October when the administration sanctioned Petro, accusing his socialist regime of allowing drug cartels to, quote, flourish and funnel cocaine into the U.S. And the concern from Washington has only deepened as Petro pursues peace talks with Klandoglolfo. In just a few weeks ago, the two sides signed an agreement in Qatar that would allow AGC fighters to assemble in designated zones in Colombia,

giving members protection from prosecution as peace talks continue, weakening of course enforcement. Now, this terror designation by the White House does not grant automatic authority for American military strikes. It does, however, strengthen the legal foundation for the use of such force against those terrorist threats, meaning military operations are eventually possible. And that, my friends, is the PDB afternoon bulletin for Thursday, the 18th of December. If you have any questions or comments, please reach out to me at PDB at thefirsttv.com. And, of course, to listen to the show ad-free, well, you can do that. It's very simple.

Just become a premium member of the president's daily brief by visiting PDB premium.com. I'm Mike Baker, and I'll be back tomorrow. Until then, stay informed. Stay safe. Stay cool.