January 8, 2026 • 9 mins
White House Reporter for Axios, Marc Caputo, breaks down Trump's Venezuela strategy and explains why this intervention was so important to the administration.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's go to the highline and bring in Axios White
House reporter Mark Capudo. You can check out all of
his work and a whole lot more at axios dot
com and you can follow him on x at Mark A. Capudo.
Mark really appreciate you taking a few minutes to come
on this show. I want to talk about your new
piece really breaking down the Trump administration strategy when it
(00:21):
comes to Venezuela.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
What have you learned?
Speaker 3 (00:24):
I think it's really how Trump approaches problems and his
administration helps him solve them, which is Donald Trump has
like kind of big, simple goals and then he tasks
different people to execute on them to get him the
best options so he can get there. So what does
(00:45):
that mean in concrete terms in Venezuela? The United States
wants a stable, pro US government, and to stabilize it,
it's going to use Venezuela's oil revenue.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
That's the plan.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
They're not really talking about democracy, they're not talking about
nation building beyond making sure that there's a stable government.
So a lot of these conversations about oh, when are
they going to have elections, that's not really what's driving
the Trump administration and driving Trump and then the lead
up to the abduction or whatever the proper verb is
(01:21):
of Maduro. Donald Trump came into office, which I wrote
about book three days before he was sworn in. Yet
they wanted to get rid of Maduro, and so the
question was how, and there were a bunch of options.
One option was to sort of entice him, almost bribe him,
say you can leave Venezuela with all of your ill
gotten games, see you know, have a good life.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Another one was to then mass.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
Ships offshore and start blowing things up to tell them
you better leave or we're gonna snatch you.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Well, Maduro still didn't leave.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Then they snatched him, Like this is how they do things.
It's not like sort of one grand strategy with the
these series of timetables. It's very much a decision making
process where there's essentially a soult decider and that's Donald Trump.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Why was Venezuela such a focus for the Trump administration?
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Just kind of quoting the Trump administration so you know
that people might think, it's my opinion. Venezuela was a
bad actor. Maduro was a bad guy, and they were
hosting bad people and bad organizations or better said, bad countries.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Venezuela was an ally of.
Speaker 3 (02:32):
All of the United States's enemy Venezuela was run by
a dictator who stole his elections and had been indicted
for cocaine trafficking. The United States has a history of
snatching even foreign leaders or former foreign leaders for cocaine
trafficking after they've been united In nineteen eighty nine, there
was in Panama Manuel Noriego. The United States actually launched
more of a full scale war there, snatched him, took
(02:54):
him back the United States, and he faced justice and
was convicted. The other one was one Orlando Hernandez, the
former a president of Honduras, who after he left office,
was promptly extradited the United States and was convicted. In
a wrinkle, he was pardoned by Trump in what many
in the administrations certainly wish Trump wouldn't have done. But
(03:17):
that's a whole other story that might take a whole
other segment to talk about.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
We're joined by Axios White House reporter Mark Kapudo. How
much of this is tied to Cuba, if any of
it is at all?
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Well, But again, Venezuela, in the United States view and
the Trump administration view, was allied with rogue regimes and
hostile foreign powers.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Chief among those is Cuba in Iran.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
There's also China and Russia, not necessarily in that order
with China and Russia. But the fact is is Venezuela
has helped sort of keep the lights on, almost literally
in Cuba by sending them free oil. And there's been
sort of a symbiotic relationship between the Venezuela is financially
supported and certainly you know, from a resource standpoint, supported
(04:06):
Cuba with that free oil, and in return, Cuba supplied
free intelligence agents and the officers and officials who were
supposed to protect Madurea.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
It helped keep him in power.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Obviously, that didn't work out on Saturday, where at least
thirty two Cuban intelligence officers wound up getting killed trying
to defend him. It also put the lie to Maduro
saying in the past all the only Cubans who are
here are doctors, there's no intelligence officials or any of that.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Well, you know, we see that wasn't true.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
You've covered Florida politics and followed it for a long time.
We know Donald Trump is the ultimate decision maker on
these issues. But how big of a role has Secretary
of State marc or Rubil played in all of.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
This huge because Donald Trump wants his advisors to get
him the best actionable plans, information and intelligence, and there's
few people in the world who have the sort of
expertise and depth of knowledge that Marco Rubio does. He
was on the Foreign Affairs Committee when he was a
(05:11):
United States Center and he was on the Intelligence Committee,
and obviously prior to that, he was a state legislator,
and having grown up in Miami's hothouse of anti Castro,
anti communist Cuban American politics, he has long been a
livid opponent of the Venezuelan, Cuban and Nicaraguan regimes.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Last thing I want to touch on with you, and
again we're joined by Marko Pudo Axios White House Report.
He could find his work and a whole lot more
at axios dot com. An issue almost just as important
as the Hurricanes taking on Ole Miss tonight. You're a
huge fan of the YU. How are you feeling about
the matchup?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
I'm not feeling great, but I usually don't feel great.
So so far, so far, my pessimism has been rewarded
with doing better than expected. I think Old Miss has
too great of a quarterback, and Carson Beck, Miami's quarterback,
his deep ball really isn't there. If Miami wins, it's
(06:15):
going to I wouldn't say it's going to be, but
a key to Miami winning is going to be controlling
the clock, having a very strong run game. Ole Miss
doesn't have a very strong run defense relative to some others,
and also having the defense the Miami defense be able
to be rested so that they can deal with Austin Shambliss,
the scrambling quarterback of whole Miss, and not get tired.
(06:36):
So if Miami can control the clock, chew up their defense,
and then keep their offenses off the field and minimize
the damage too much, that's the key to Miami Hurricanes win.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
But I'm not holding my breath, just happy that they're here.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
I mean, they won the two postseason games that I
didn't think they were going to win, so great.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Hopefully I'm wrong.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Again, I get this sense and correct me if I'm wrong.
The hardcore fans of the Hurricanes still not fully bought
into Mario Crystaball despite the recent success. What are your
thoughts on him and trust him in a big game
like that?
Speaker 3 (07:07):
I think I think the postseason has helped people buy
in the crystal ball. But the problem that he's had
is that the team has these bizarre collapses like mid
season that they just shouldn't have, and it just it
suggests there's some sort of motivational problem with the teams. Like,
for instance, they really shouldn't have lost to Louisville, they
got out coached. They shouldn't have lost to SMU, they
(07:29):
got out coached and sort of outplayed, and like when
you have those just bizarre.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Situations, you're like, well, what's going on here?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
Also, the offense for way too long was way too
vanilla and predictive and predictable, and that was part of
the ingredients of feeding into those losses.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
But Shannon Dawson, the offensive coordinator.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Has started to add some more wrinkles to the offense, which,
you know, people are.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
Starting to believe a little more.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
But obviously if they some beat All miss you know,
and then they somehow beat who I sume is going
to be Indiana because I saw Oregon playing in the
Orange Bowl and was not impressed.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yeah, certainly people will definitely believe They'll have to.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
I like the Hurricanes tonight, the one caveat being why.
I think the defense and I think, you know, Ole
miss it's been a nice little one that they've had
without Lane Kiffen, But I don't know, I just feel
like it could come to the question mark for me
is Carson Beck. I could see him making a mistake
or too that could really hurt the Hurricanes, right.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
I mean you saw from the Ohio steak it. I
mean he didn't really complete any passes.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Over twelve yards. There's a way to beat the Miami defense,
which is to crowd the box, stuff the run, and
force Carson Beck to throw it long. Yeah, but you
know that's easier said than done. You know, one of
the two steps to becoming a millionaire step number one,
get a million dollars.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Yeah, I mean that's a tough Miami does have a
beast of an offensive line, and Mark Fletcher is playing
with a different gear and a different set of a
different heart than he had all season.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
There was a reason I didn't book a college football
analyst to break down tonight's gain.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
I knew I had you, Mark, so I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Axios, White House Reporter, thanks so much, Mark, capudo with
us again. You can check out all of his work
at axios dot com, and you can follow him on
x at Mark Akpudo, The Ryan Gorman Show on NewsRadio WFLA,
follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Ryan Gorman Show,
and find us online at Ryan Gormanshow dot com
Let's go to the highline and bring in Axios White
House reporter Mark Capudo. You can check out all of
his work and a whole lot more at axios dot
com and you can follow him on x at Mark A. Capudo.
Mark really appreciate you taking a few minutes to come
on this show. I want to talk about your new
piece really breaking down the Trump administration strategy when it
(00:21):
comes to Venezuela.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
What have you learned?
Speaker 3 (00:24):
I think it's really how Trump approaches problems and his
administration helps him solve them, which is Donald Trump has
like kind of big, simple goals and then he tasks
different people to execute on them to get him the
best options so he can get there. So what does
(00:45):
that mean in concrete terms in Venezuela? The United States
wants a stable, pro US government, and to stabilize it,
it's going to use Venezuela's oil revenue.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
That's the plan.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
They're not really talking about democracy, they're not talking about
nation building beyond making sure that there's a stable government.
So a lot of these conversations about oh, when are
they going to have elections, that's not really what's driving
the Trump administration and driving Trump and then the lead
up to the abduction or whatever the proper verb is
(01:21):
of Maduro. Donald Trump came into office, which I wrote
about book three days before he was sworn in. Yet
they wanted to get rid of Maduro, and so the
question was how, and there were a bunch of options.
One option was to sort of entice him, almost bribe him,
say you can leave Venezuela with all of your ill
gotten games, see you know, have a good life.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Another one was to then mass.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
Ships offshore and start blowing things up to tell them
you better leave or we're gonna snatch you.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Well, Maduro still didn't leave.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Then they snatched him, Like this is how they do things.
It's not like sort of one grand strategy with the
these series of timetables. It's very much a decision making
process where there's essentially a soult decider and that's Donald Trump.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Why was Venezuela such a focus for the Trump administration?
Speaker 3 (02:15):
Just kind of quoting the Trump administration so you know
that people might think, it's my opinion. Venezuela was a
bad actor. Maduro was a bad guy, and they were
hosting bad people and bad organizations or better said, bad countries.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Venezuela was an ally of.
Speaker 3 (02:32):
All of the United States's enemy Venezuela was run by
a dictator who stole his elections and had been indicted
for cocaine trafficking. The United States has a history of
snatching even foreign leaders or former foreign leaders for cocaine
trafficking after they've been united In nineteen eighty nine, there
was in Panama Manuel Noriego. The United States actually launched
more of a full scale war there, snatched him, took
(02:54):
him back the United States, and he faced justice and
was convicted. The other one was one Orlando Hernandez, the
former a president of Honduras, who after he left office,
was promptly extradited the United States and was convicted. In
a wrinkle, he was pardoned by Trump in what many
in the administrations certainly wish Trump wouldn't have done. But
(03:17):
that's a whole other story that might take a whole
other segment to talk about.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
We're joined by Axios White House reporter Mark Kapudo. How
much of this is tied to Cuba, if any of
it is at all?
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Well, But again, Venezuela, in the United States view and
the Trump administration view, was allied with rogue regimes and
hostile foreign powers.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Chief among those is Cuba in Iran.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
There's also China and Russia, not necessarily in that order
with China and Russia. But the fact is is Venezuela
has helped sort of keep the lights on, almost literally
in Cuba by sending them free oil. And there's been
sort of a symbiotic relationship between the Venezuela is financially
supported and certainly you know, from a resource standpoint, supported
(04:06):
Cuba with that free oil, and in return, Cuba supplied
free intelligence agents and the officers and officials who were
supposed to protect Madurea.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
It helped keep him in power.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Obviously, that didn't work out on Saturday, where at least
thirty two Cuban intelligence officers wound up getting killed trying
to defend him. It also put the lie to Maduro
saying in the past all the only Cubans who are
here are doctors, there's no intelligence officials or any of that.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Well, you know, we see that wasn't true.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
You've covered Florida politics and followed it for a long time.
We know Donald Trump is the ultimate decision maker on
these issues. But how big of a role has Secretary
of State marc or Rubil played in all of.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
This huge because Donald Trump wants his advisors to get
him the best actionable plans, information and intelligence, and there's
few people in the world who have the sort of
expertise and depth of knowledge that Marco Rubio does. He
was on the Foreign Affairs Committee when he was a
(05:11):
United States Center and he was on the Intelligence Committee,
and obviously prior to that, he was a state legislator,
and having grown up in Miami's hothouse of anti Castro,
anti communist Cuban American politics, he has long been a
livid opponent of the Venezuelan, Cuban and Nicaraguan regimes.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Last thing I want to touch on with you, and
again we're joined by Marko Pudo Axios White House Report.
He could find his work and a whole lot more
at axios dot com. An issue almost just as important
as the Hurricanes taking on Ole Miss tonight. You're a
huge fan of the YU. How are you feeling about
the matchup?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
I'm not feeling great, but I usually don't feel great.
So so far, so far, my pessimism has been rewarded
with doing better than expected. I think Old Miss has
too great of a quarterback, and Carson Beck, Miami's quarterback,
his deep ball really isn't there. If Miami wins, it's
(06:15):
going to I wouldn't say it's going to be, but
a key to Miami winning is going to be controlling
the clock, having a very strong run game. Ole Miss
doesn't have a very strong run defense relative to some others,
and also having the defense the Miami defense be able
to be rested so that they can deal with Austin Shambliss,
the scrambling quarterback of whole Miss, and not get tired.
(06:36):
So if Miami can control the clock, chew up their defense,
and then keep their offenses off the field and minimize
the damage too much, that's the key to Miami Hurricanes win.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
But I'm not holding my breath, just happy that they're here.
Speaker 3 (06:47):
I mean, they won the two postseason games that I
didn't think they were going to win, so great.
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Hopefully I'm wrong.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Again, I get this sense and correct me if I'm wrong.
The hardcore fans of the Hurricanes still not fully bought
into Mario Crystaball despite the recent success. What are your
thoughts on him and trust him in a big game
like that?
Speaker 3 (07:07):
I think I think the postseason has helped people buy
in the crystal ball. But the problem that he's had
is that the team has these bizarre collapses like mid
season that they just shouldn't have, and it just it
suggests there's some sort of motivational problem with the teams. Like,
for instance, they really shouldn't have lost to Louisville, they
got out coached. They shouldn't have lost to SMU, they
(07:29):
got out coached and sort of outplayed, and like when
you have those just bizarre.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Situations, you're like, well, what's going on here?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
Also, the offense for way too long was way too
vanilla and predictive and predictable, and that was part of
the ingredients of feeding into those losses.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
But Shannon Dawson, the offensive coordinator.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
Has started to add some more wrinkles to the offense, which,
you know, people are.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
Starting to believe a little more.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
But obviously if they some beat All miss you know,
and then they somehow beat who I sume is going
to be Indiana because I saw Oregon playing in the
Orange Bowl and was not impressed.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yeah, certainly people will definitely believe They'll have to.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
I like the Hurricanes tonight, the one caveat being why.
I think the defense and I think, you know, Ole
miss it's been a nice little one that they've had
without Lane Kiffen, But I don't know, I just feel
like it could come to the question mark for me
is Carson Beck. I could see him making a mistake
or too that could really hurt the Hurricanes, right.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
I mean you saw from the Ohio steak it. I
mean he didn't really complete any passes.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Over twelve yards. There's a way to beat the Miami defense,
which is to crowd the box, stuff the run, and
force Carson Beck to throw it long. Yeah, but you
know that's easier said than done. You know, one of
the two steps to becoming a millionaire step number one,
get a million dollars.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Yeah, I mean that's a tough Miami does have a
beast of an offensive line, and Mark Fletcher is playing
with a different gear and a different set of a
different heart than he had all season.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
There was a reason I didn't book a college football
analyst to break down tonight's gain.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
I knew I had you, Mark, so I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Axios, White House Reporter, thanks so much, Mark, capudo with
us again. You can check out all of his work
at axios dot com, and you can follow him on
x at Mark Akpudo, The Ryan Gorman Show on NewsRadio WFLA,
follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Ryan Gorman Show,
and find us online at Ryan Gormanshow dot com
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