Trump says US land action against alleged drug trafficking networks in Venezuela will start ‘very soon’

President Donald Trump suggested Thursday that the United States is preparing to take new action against alleged drug trafficking networks in Venezuela, telling service members during a Thanksgiving call that efforts for strikes on land will be starting “very soon.”

“In recent weeks, you’ve been working to deter Venezuelan drug traffickers, of which there are many. Of course, there aren’t too many coming in by sea anymore,” Trump told service members in the call.

“You probably noticed that people aren’t wanting to be delivering by sea, and we’ll be starting to stop them by land also,” the president continued. “The land is easier, but that’s going to start very soon.

“We warn them: Stop sending poison to our country,” Trump added.

Trump comments suggest he has made up his mind on a course of action in Venezuela following multiple high-level briefings and a mounting US show of force in the region earlier this month.

Trump designated Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his government allies as members of a foreign terrorist organization earlier this week.

The designation of “Cartel de los Soles,” a phrase that experts say is more a description of allegedly corrupt government officials than an organized crime group, as a foreign terrorist organization will authorize Trump to impose fresh sanctions targeting Maduro’s assets and infrastructure. It doesn’t, however, explicitly authorize the use of lethal force, according to legal experts.

The US military has amassed more than a dozen warships and 15,000 troops in the region as part of what the Pentagon has branded “Operation Southern Spear.” The US military has killed more than 80 people in boat strikes as part of the anti-drug-trafficking campaign.

CNN reported earlier this month that Trump administration officials told lawmakers in a classified session the US was not planning to launch strikes inside Venezuela and doesn’t have a legal justification that would support attacks against any land targets right now.

Lawmakers were told during the session that an opinion produced by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel to justify strikes against suspected drug boats does not permit strikes inside Venezuela itself or any other territories, four sources said.

The officials did not rule out any potential future actions, one of the sources said.

The administration has largely tried to avoid involving Congress in its military campaign around Latin America. A senior Justice Department official told Congress in November that the US military could continue its lethal strikes on alleged drug traffickers without congressional approval and that the administration is not bound by a decades-old war powers law that would mandate working with lawmakers, CNN has reported.