Crockett drops ‘receipts’ about Trump’s Venezuela takeover, says he and Maduro have things in common

“The difference [between Maduro and Trump] is Maduro was successful,” U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett told ABC’s “The View.”

Texas U.S. Senate candidate Jasmine Crockett slammed President Donald Trump and his U.S. raid and takeover in Venezuela on ABC’s “The View,” listing off reasons why she isn’t buying the president’s claims about his actions in the Latin American country. The popular Democratic U.S. congresswoman also noted that Trump and the authoritarian former Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, have something in common.

“I know there are a lot of people that are talking about this is good for the Venezuelan people, because Maduro was a bad guy, but that’s not why [Trump] did it,” Crockett said on Tuesday of the Trump administration’s Jan. 3 military raid in Venezuela and capture of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, who are now facing narcoterrorism and conspiracy charges in New York City. “He has not cared about Venezuelans at all. Let me be clear about that.”

Crockett, a former civil rights attorney, noted that President Trump has repeatedly targeted Venezuelans, including those living in the United States.

“Here are the receipts: The [Alien] Enemies Aliens Act [of 1798], which most of us had never heard of because it’s from the 1700s, [Trump] invoked it specifically because of Venezuelans. He said we are being attacked and invaded by Venezuelans. That was number one,” said Crockett.

The Texas lawmaker explained that Trump used the 18th-century law to deport Venezuelans to the notorious prison, CECOT, in El Salvador.

“Remember the ’60 Minutes’ episode that they did not want to air about? How they were treating them, mistreating them, at CECOT, that’s where he sent Venezuelans,” said Crockett.

The congresswoman also called out Trump’s military strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea that have killed more than 100 people, telling the ladies of “The View” that the president was “illegally killing folk” without due process.

“It was supposedly about fentanyl,” said Crockett, who noted that the drug does not come from Venezuela.

The U.S. Senate hopeful, who is facing a primary election on March 3, argued that Trump’s actions “ain’t about Venezuelans.” She added, “I get that there are people that don’t like the leader, but guess what? There are a lot of people that don’t like our leader. Regardless, somebody coming into the United States and grabbing our leader in the middle of the night and killing people in this country—I’m sure everybody would be outraged at them doing it that way.”

Crockett said Trump and Maduro aren’t so different.

“As we sit here on January 6, I do want to be clear, somebody else was trying to be a Maduro of the United States. Somebody else wanted to do the exact same thing,” she said, referencing Trump’s refusal to accept his 2020 presidential election loss and alleged involvement in the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Maduro, who lost the 2024 election according to independent vote counts, retained power against the will of the Venezuelan voters.

Crockett added, “The difference [between Maduro and Trump] is Maduro was successful.”