President Donald Trump on Saturday effectively instructed the world’s airlines to steer clear of Venezuelan skies, a dramatic escalation in Washington’s confrontation with Nicolás Maduro that sharpened fears of looming military action in the Caribbean.
In a predawn post on Truth Social, Trump wrote: “To all Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers, please consider THE AIRSPACE ABOVE AND SURROUNDING VENEZUELA TO BE CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY.”
For weeks, the White House has openly accused Maduro’s inner circle of functioning as a criminal cartel, a shift that signals the administration is laying the legal foundation for strikes against government-linked targets.
Caracas responded within hours, denouncing the message as an assault on national sovereignty. The government called the directive “a new extravagant, illegal, and unjustified aggression against the people of Venezuela” and insisted that “Venezuela will not accept orders, threats, or interference from any foreign power.” In its statement, the Maduro government further declared that “no authority outside the Venezuelan institutional framework has the power to interfere with, block, or condition the use of national airspace.” Venezuelan officials also accused Washington of freezing the weekly deportation flights negotiated earlier this year.
The administration’s posture has hardened steadily. It recently designated the so-called Cartel de los Soles — a narcotics network allegedly linked to senior Venezuelan officials — as a foreign terrorist organization, a move that could provide legal justification for targeting military or intelligence sites tied to the regime.
At the same time, U.S. military activity in the region has surged to levels not seen in decades. A U.S. official, speaking anonymously, said American aircraft are flying “near-constant” patrols just outside Venezuelan airspace as part of expanded counterdrug operations. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine spent Thanksgiving touring Caribbean facilities, conferring with allied governments, and visiting U.S. troops, according to The Washington Post.
The Dominican Republic has quietly opened a major airport and air base for American aircraft to refuel. In Puerto Rico, the U.S. presence has swollen, with roughly 15,000 service members now stationed across the region alongside more than a dozen warships — the largest U.S. force concentration in the Caribbean in a generation.
Despite Trump’s pronouncement, some commercial flights continued moving through Venezuelan airspace on Saturday. Airlines may reroute in the coming days to reduce operational risk or avoid complications with insurance carriers. The Federal Aviation Administration last week had already urged pilots “to exercise caution” over Venezuela due to worsening security conditions and heightened military activity.
Trump has continued to leave his intentions deliberately ambiguous. Speaking aboard Air Force One days earlier, he said: “If we can save lives, if you can do things the easy way, that’s fine. And if we have to do it the hard way, that’s fine too.”
