United States leaders reacted early Saturday morning as President Trump confirmed overnight military strikes in Venezuela and announced the capture of the country's leader, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife. 

Mr. Trump said Maduro and his wife had been flown out of Venezuela and will be taken to New York. The U.S. Army's Delta Force, an elite special forces unit, carried out the operation to capture them, officials told CBS News. The Trump administration notified Congressional leaders about the operation only after it began, Congressional sources told CBS News. 

Maduro, 63, has led Venezuela since 2013. His most recent election was disputed by international observers and the U.S. recognized opposition candidate Edmundo González as the winner. The U.S. imposed sanctions against election officials for allegedly rigging the outcome, but Maduro was still sworn in for a third term in January.

Attorney General Pam Bondi said on Saturday morning that Maduro and his wife have been indicted in the Southern District of New York on narco-terrorism charges. Maduro was previously indicted in 2020 on allegations that he and other senior Venezuelan government officials collaborated with the Colombian guerrilla group Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, or FARC, to traffic cocaine and weapons to the United States.

The Justice Department also accused Maduro of leading a criminal organization called Cártel de Los Soles. The Trump administration designated the group as a foreign terrorist organization last year, though some experts have questioned that characterization. The U.S. has been offering a $50 million reward for information leading to Maduro's capture.  

A CBS News poll in November found that 70% of Americans would oppose the U.S. taking military action in Venezuela, and 75% said the Trump administration would need Congressional approval. Most surveyed also said they did not see Venezuela as a major threat to the United States.

Republicans react

House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, said he spoke with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth after the operation in Venezuela.

"Nicolas Maduro is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans after years of trafficking illegal drugs and violent cartel members into our country — crimes for which he's been properly indicted in U.S. courts and an arrest warrant duly issued — and today he learned what accountability looks like," Johnson said. "President Trump is putting American lives first, succeeding where others have failed, and under his leadership the United States will no longer allow criminal regimes to profit from wreaking havoc and destruction on our country." 

Senate Intelligence Chair Tom Cotton, a Republican from Arkansas, said he spoke with Rubio and that Venezuela's interim government "must now decide whether to continue the drug trafficking and colluding with adversaries like Iran and Cuba or whether to act like a normal nation and return to the civilized world." 

"I urge them to choose wisely," he said. 

Utah Sen. Mike Lee said that he also spoke with Rubio, who said that Maduro would be brought to the U.S. Lee also said that Rubio "anticipates no further action in Venezuela now that Maduro is in U.S. custody." 

Lee added that the operation "likely falls within the president's inherent authority under Article II of the Constitution to protect U.S. personnel from an actual or imminent attack," but did not offer any other details. 

Vice President JD Vance praised the "brave special operators who pulled off a truly impressive operation." 

"Maduro is the newest person to find out that President Trump means what he says," Vance said. The vice president highlighted Maduro's previous indictments as justification for the operation. 

"You don't get to avoid justice for drug trafficking the United States because you live in a palace in Caracas," he said. 

U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, released a statement calling Maduro's capture "an important first step to bring him to justice for the drug crimes for which he has been indicted in the United States." He said he spoke to Rubio on Saturday morning and was looking forward to further briefings when the Senate returns next week. 

House Intelligence Chair Rick Crawford, a Republican from Arkansas, drew comparisons to the arrest of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega in 1990. 

"It's a great day for Venezuela," Crawford told CBS News in an interview.

"We have a president in office here now that's not playing around," he said. "What we need to understand is if we're going to have a safe America, that requires a safe neighborhood." 

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, criticized the operation. Greene is set to leave Congress on Monday after announcing her surprise resignation in November amid a major falling out with Mr. Trump. In a lengthy post on X, she said the move contradicts Mr. Trump's anti-intervention stance and suggested the operation had more to do with regime change than stopping drug trafficking. She asked why the Trump administration had not done more to target Mexican cartels, and questioned the controversial pardon of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who had been sentenced to 45 years in prison for trafficking cocaine into the U.S. 

"Americans disgust with our own government's never ending military aggression and support of foreign wars is justified because we are forced to pay for it and both parties, Republicans and Democrats, always keep the Washington military machine funded and going," Greene wrote. "This is what many in MAGA thought they voted to end. Boy were we wrong."

Democrats react

Democrat lawmakers criticized the Trump administration for acting unilaterally.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a Democrat from New York, said Maduro is a "criminal and authoritarian dictator who has oppressed the people of Venezuela for years," but that Mr. Trump "has the constitutional responsibility to follow the law and protect democratic norms in the United States." 

"The promotion of security and stability in a region requires more than just military force as we painfully discovered in Iraq and Afghanistan," Jeffries said. "Far too many questions remain unanswered," he added, including whether American troops remain on the ground in Venezuela and details of Mr. Trump's claim that the U.S. will run the Latin American country until a judicious transition occurs. 

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, also from New York, echoed Jeffries' sentiment by calling Maduro "an illegitimate dictator" but saying that "launching military action without congressional authorization and without a credible plan for what comes next is reckless." 

"The idea that Trump plans to now run Venezuela should strike fear in the hearts of all Americans. The American people have seen this before and paid the devastating price," Schumer wrote.  "The administration must brief Congress immediately on its objectives, and its plan to prevent a humanitarian and geopolitical disaster that plunges us into another endless war or one that trades one corrupt dictator for another."

Rep. Adam Smith, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, told CBS News 24/7 that "there's no evidence whatsoever this makes America safer."

"This doesn't seem to have much to do with drugs," Smith said, and to him, "it seems what this is about is Trump wants Venezuela's oil."

What also concerns him is what happens next, asking: "Is his plan to invade?"

The U.S. has done that before in places like Iraq and Libya, he said, and each time, "it always ends badly."

"The notion that the U.S. military can reach in and fix that problem with the use of force? This is what Trump ran against," Smith said.

Rubio had only recently assured Congress that intervention in Venezuela wasn't about regime change, Smith said.

"And obviously it's clear that was the goal," he said.

House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Ranking Member Jim Himes, a Democrat from Connecticut, called on the administration to "immediately brief Congress on its plan to ensure stability in the region and its legal justification for this decision."

Sen. Tim Kaine, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, called the operation an "unauthorized military attack" and a "sickening return to a day when the United States asserted the right to dominate the internal political affairs of all nations in the Western Hemisphere." 

"That history is replete with failures, and doubling down on it makes it difficult to make the claim with a straight face that other countries should respect the United States' sovereignty when we do not do the same," Kaine said.

He said that his bipartisan resolution stipulating the U.S. not enter war with Venezuela without a clear Congressional authorization will be up for a vote next week. 

"Where will this go next? Will the President deploy our troops to protect Iranian protesters? To enforce the fragile ceasefire in Gaza? To battle terrorists in Nigeria? To seize Greenland or the Panama Canal? To suppress Americans peacefully assembling to protest his policies?" Kaine said. "Trump has threatened to do all this and more and sees no need to seek legal authorization from people's elected legislature before putting servicemembers at risk. It is long past time for Congress to reassert its critical constitutional role in matters of war, peace, diplomacy and trade ... We've entered the 250th year of American democracy and cannot allow it to devolve into the tyranny that our founders fought to escape." 

Sen. Andy Kim, a Democrat from New Jersey, said that Mr. Trump "rejected our Constitutionally required approval process for armed conflict because the Administration knows the American people overwhelmingly reject risks pulling our nation into another war." Kim also accused Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of lying to Congress when they met with leaders last month about fatal strikes on alleged drug vessels and said the Trump administration's goal was not regime change.

Former Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris said on social media Sunday night that the U.S. operation  in Venezuela didn't "make America safer, stronger, or more affordable."

"That Maduro is a brutal, illegitimate dictator does not change the fact that this action was both unlawful and unwise," Harris wrote. "We've seen this movie before. Wars for regime change or oil that are sold as strength but turn into chaos, and American families pay the price. The American people do not want this, and they are tired of being lied to. This is not about drugs or democracy. It is about oil and Donald Trump's desire to play the regional strongman.  ... The President is putting troops at risk, spending billions, destabilizing a region, and offering no legal authority, no exit plan, and no benefit at home."

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who took office on Thursday, issued a statement saying "unilaterally attacking a sovereign nation is an act of war and a violation of federal and international law." 

"This blatant pursuit of regime change doesn't just affect those abroad, it directly impacts New Yorkers, including tens of thousands of Venezuelans who call this city home," Mamdani said. "My focus is their safety and the safety of every New Yorker, and my administration will continue to monitor the situation and issue relevant guidance."

Florida residents cheer operation

South Florida, which is home to a large population of Venezuelans, saw celebrations early Saturday. People hugged, sang the U.S. and Venezuelan national anthems, and waved flags outside the community gathering spot El Arepazo. 

"President Trump has changed the course of history in our hemisphere. Our country & the world are safer for it," said Florida Republican Rep. Carlos A. Gimenez. "Today's decisive action is this hemisphere's equivalent to the Fall of the Berlin Wall. It's a big day in Florida, where the majority of Venezuelan, Cuban, & Nicaraguan exiles reside. This is the community I represent & we are overwhelmed with emotion and hope."