WORLD Radio News - WORLD Radio News: 1-7-26 (1/3)

Episode Date: January 7, 2026

The latest headlines in three minutes from WORLD updated three times throughout the day.Sign-up for the daily Sift email at thesift.org.Support sound journalism, grounded in facts and Biblical truth at wng.org/donate.

With World Radio News, I'm Kent Covington. Debate continues in Washington over the operation in Venezuela had captured dictator Nicolas Maduro. While Republicans defend the action, Democrats continue to criticize it, Senator Chris Coons. What's to stop communist China from using the exact same example and saying, okay, our courts have declared the president of Taiwan a criminal. We're going to go in there, kidnap him, bring him back to stand trial in China,

and then blockade Taiwan. Attorney General Pam Bondi, though, says the United States did not arbitrarily declare Maduro a criminal, adding that there is a mountain of evidence of his crimes. They supplied these drug dealers with machine guns, with grenades, with everything to further their cocaine conspiracy and what they were doing around our country. The Trump administration also notes that unlike Taiwan's elections,

UN panel and more than 50 nations flagged the last Venezuelan election as illegitimate. President Trump huddled with Republican lawmakers at a GOP retreat Tuesday to strategize ahead of this year's midterm election. There he laid out what he called a roadmap to victory for GOP lawmakers, calling on them to highlight successes from the past year.

Among those, he said, was that weekend operation in Venezuela. He said Republicans should tout it even if Democrats continue to fault it. You know, at some point, they should say, you know, you did a great job. Thank you. Congratulations.

It wouldn't it be good? U.S. forces captured Maduro and his wife at a Venezuelan military base over the weekend. They now face federal drug trafficking charges in the United States. President Trump also remarked on the death of GOP congressman Doug Lamalfa of California. He reportedly died during an unspecified emergency surgery. Trump called him a fantastic person and a friend. The 65-year-old congressman served seven terms representing Northern California's first district. His death further trims the narrow GOP majority in the House from six seats to five.

California's governor will call a special election to fill the seat. Protests in Iran over the country's struggling economy spread to a historic commercial hub on Tuesday. World's Kristen Flavin reports. Merchants and others staged a sit-in at Tehran's Grand Bazaar. Security forces used tear gas to break up the crowd as much of the market shut down. The unrest comes amid a deep slide in Iran's currency, the Rial, which hit a record low, feeding anger over prices and shortages. Rights monitors say at least 36 people have now been killed and more than 1,200 arrested since protests began late last month. For World, I'm Kristen Flavin.

And I'm Kent Covington. For more sound journalism grounded in facts and biblical truth, visit worldradio.com. Additional support comes from Medashear, where many families save $500 a month on their health care. Metashare.com slash world.