When Republican leaders go on the Sunday shows and calmly correct the narrative being peddled by cable television, hardworking Americans should sit up and pay attention. Marco Rubio did exactly that on Meet the Press, patiently walking host Kristen Welker through the facts and pushing back against the cheap, reflexive “oil greed” line the left loves to repeat. It was a small, important victory for truth over the elite media’s spin.
The capture of Nicolás Maduro was not a figment of fantasy reporting — it was a bold, decisive action announced by the president, and he explicitly said the United States would “run” Venezuela until a safe, proper transition could be arranged. Conservatives who have been calling for strength in the Western Hemisphere saw leadership in action, something the political class in Washington too often refuses to deliver. While the elites howl about process, the administration has acted to secure American interests and Americans’ safety.
Rubio was blunt about the real calculus: “We don’t need Venezuela’s oil,” he told Welker, and that statement deserves to be repeated to every anchor who insists otherwise. The aim isn’t a land grab for crude; it’s to prevent Russia, China, Iran, and other adversaries from turning Venezuela into a strategic asset against the United States. Americans are allowed to want our hemisphere kept secure and our energy infrastructure unthreatened.
Beyond rhetoric, Rubio framed the mission for what it was: a law-enforcement and counternarcotics operation targeting an indicted drug trafficker who turned his country into a narco-state, not an open-ended war of occupation. That distinction matters because it shows the administration is enforcing American law and protecting our borders from cartels and malign foreign influence. If the media wants to play lawyerly games about authorizations, the public should remember past failures of inaction that led to crime and chaos at our doorstep.
There’s also a pragmatic energy argument Rubio made that the press refuses to own: U.S. Gulf Coast refineries are uniquely capable of processing Venezuela’s heavy crude, and the administration’s plan to quarantine and rehabilitate the industry is designed to deny that resource to America’s enemies while benefiting the Venezuelan people. That’s not imperialism; it’s sensible leverage that rebuilds a broken industry and drains power from kleptocrats and foreign patrons alike. The choice is between American investment and global adversaries profiting off Venezuelan misery.
The predictable chorus from the left — lemons about “regime change” and claims the operation was about oil — is exactly why Rubio’s straight talk was necessary. Democrats and their media friends have instinctively sided with the narrative that the United States must politely stand by while our hemisphere is used as a staging ground by Iran, Russia, and Cuba. That hypocrisy should outrage patriots: talk is cheap, but action to secure our nation and its neighbors is priceless.
We should be proud that our country still has leaders willing to act, and we should demand clarity, accountability, and results as this unfolds. Support strong, lawful measures that protect Americans from narco-traffickers and foreign influence, but insist on a responsible plan to restore Venezuelan sovereignty and prosperity for the Venezuelan people. The choice before us is plain: back weakness and watch adversaries move in, or back strength and defend the homeland — conservatives choose the latter every time.
