As promised, here are the key points from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has spoken to US media outlets this morning.
- This is “not a war against Venezuela”, he says - this follows strikes on the country on Saturday and the extraction of its president, Nicolás Maduro
- The US will judge Venezuela by “what they do” next, Rubio says, adding that Washington will keep “multiple levers of leverage” to protect its interests
- Speaking to ABC, Rubio says congressional authorisation wasn’t needed before the operation “because this wasn’t an invasion”
- He says that he hopes Maduro’s removal will lead to “a better Venezuela”, but adds that the “number one objective is America”
- Asked whether he thinks Interim President Delcy Rodríguez is now the legitimate president of Venezuela, he says the US does not believe the regime is legitimate


Why am I not surprised that you don’t understand the difference between a court and a government, much less between the International Court of Justice legitimised by the countries agreeing about its jurisdiction and a “Fuck the law, international and domestic, and any jurisdiction because I just do whatever I want”-wannabe dictator?
Maduro was indicted in a federal court.
Why am I not surprised you think only courts that indict the people you don’t like are legitimate? Why is it fundamentally different for a US court to do something different from a UN court? Other than the fact the UN court isn’t capable of actually arresting foreign leaders and the leaders they indict are people you don’t like. For the law to be legitimate, it should just prosecute the people it’s popular to go after. There’s plenty of dictators in the world that have done far worse than Netanyahu, where are the arrest warrants?
The ICJ is making political moves and that’s not what justice is supposed to be about and damages it’s legitimacy. The fact that actions by the US that are basically identical to the ICJ’s actions are labeled authoritarian, colonialist, actions of a rogue state, just goes to prove the illegtimacy of the the ICJ. You can’t have it both ways, either courts can indict foreign leaders and countries can execute arrests on them or they can’t. And it shouldn’t be down to a court conforming to political opinions, justice is subservient to politics is not justice at all. The ICJ seems intent on using it’s power to effect political change, same as Trump.
Look up “jurisdiction”…