White House
After Latin America took a backseat during the Trump and Obama administrations, Trump is bringing Venezuela back to the center of American foreign policy.
Two centuries ago, US President James Monroe declared the Western Hemisphere beyond the limits of European powers, in a document that became known in history books as the “Monroe Doctrine”.
The proclamation laid the groundwork for a new era of dominance and “policing” of the USA in the region.
In the following decades, nearly a third of the approximately 400 U.S. interventions around the world occurred in Latin America. The United States overthrew governments it considered unfavorable or used force later ruled illegal by international courts.
In 2013, then-Secretary of State John Kerry announced that “the era of the Monroe Doctrine is over.” This signaled a change in the way the region was treated, considering it as a partner rather than a sphere of influence.
Now, however, the National Security Strategy released last week by the Trump administration formally revived this ancient doctrine.
This helps to explain government intervention actions in the region in recent months, since the Deadly boat attacks in the Caribbean up to the selective use of sanctions and pardons.
Why is Latin America so important?
In typically arrogant style, the document openly announces a “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine, elevating the Western Hemisphere to the US’s top international priority. The days when the Middle East dominated American foreign policy “luckily they are over“, says the text.
The document also links US security and prosperity directly to maintenance of American pre-eminence in Latin America. For example, it aims to deny China and other powers access to important strategic assets in the region, such as military installations, ports, critical minerals and cyber communications networks.
Crucially, it merges the Trump administration’s aggressive rhetoric about “narco-terrorists” with the great power competition between the US and China.
The document frames a more robust American military presence and greater diplomatic pressure as necessary to confront Latin American drug cartels and protect shipping lanes, ports and critical infrastructure from Chinese influence.
How strategy explains Trump’s actions
For months, the Trump administration has targeted vessels suspected of drug trafficking in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean, killing dozens of people.
International law experts and human rights authorities say these attacks violate international law. The US Congress also did not authorize any armed conflict in these waters, but the attacks were presented as necessary to protect the US from “narco-terrorists”.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has also been labeled “drug addict”, although Venezuela is a secondary actor in the flow of drugs to the US.
On December 2, President Donald Trump told reporters that any country he believed was producing or transporting drugs into the U.S. could suffer a military attack. This includes not only Venezuela, but also Mexico and Colombia.
On the same day, Trump also granted a pardon to Juan Orlando Hernándezformer president of Honduras. He had been sentenced to 45 years in prison for helping to transport hundreds of tons of cocaine to the USA.
The new National Security Strategy attempts to explain the logic behind these contradictory actions. She emphasizes the need to protect the “essential national interests” of the US and highlights:
President Trump’s foreign policy […] it is not based on traditional political ideologies. It is motivated, above all, by what works for the United States — or, in other words, “America First”.
Within this logic, Hernández was pardoned because he can still serve US interests. As a former president with strong ties to Honduran elites and security forces, it is exactly the loyal, far-right type of customer that Trump wants in a country that hosts US military personnel and that can help control migration routes to the US.
The chosen moment reinforces this idea: Trump acted to free Hernández just days before the elections in Honduras, strengthening the conservative networks he once led to support Trump’s preferred presidential candidate, Nasry Asfura.
In Trump’s “America First” calculus, pardoning Hernández also sends some clear signals. You obedient partners are rewarded. And power, not principles, determines US policy in the region.
The obsession with Venezuela
The new security strategy explains Trump’s obsession with Venezuela, in particular.
Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world and an extensive coastline on the Caribbean Sea, a vital shipping route for American goods transiting the Panama Canal.
Under years of American sanctions, Venezuela signed several energy and mining agreements with Chinain addition to Iran and Russia. For Beijing, in particular, Venezuela represents both a source of energy and a strategic position in the hemisphere.
The Trump administration’s National Security Strategy makes clear that this is unacceptable to the United States. Although Venezuela is not explicitly mentioned in the document, the strategy alludes to the fact that China has gained influence with like-minded leaders in the region:
Some foreign influence it will be difficult to investgiven the political alliances between certain Latin American governments and certain foreign actors.
A recent report suggests that Maduro’s government is attempting a drastic geopolitical realignment. The New York Times claims that Maduro’s government has offered the US a dominant stake in its oil and gold resources, diverting exports away from China. If confirmed, this would represent a clear attempt to woo the Trump administration and put an end to Venezuela’s international isolation.
But many believe that the Trump administration is actually seeking a regime change.
Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, is presenting a post-Maduro future to American investors, describing a “$1.7 billion opportunity” to privatize Venezuela’s oil, gas and infrastructure.
For American and European companies, the message is clear: regime change could unlock immense wealth.
Latin America’s fragmented response
Regional organizations remain divided or weakened and have not yet managed to coordinate a response to the Trump administration. At a recent regional summit, leaders called for peace but stopped short of condemning American attacks in Latin America.
Instead, governments are having to deal with Trump individually. Some expect to be treated as friends; others fear being labeled “narco-states.”
Two centuries after the Monroe Doctrine, Washington still sees the hemisphere as his own backyard, in which he is “free to roam” and can interfere as he sees fit.
