Trump Sanctions Venezuela's Nephews, Not Saudi Royal Family Behind 9/11
Axios breathlessly reports on the Trump administration's sanctions against three nephews of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, a businessman, and six companies for shipping oil. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent claims Maduro is flooding the US with drugs, a convenient narrative for a nation that once propped up Pinochet and Noriega. This 'pressure campaign' sounds familiar, doesn't it? Yet, while
these Venezuelan 'narco-nephews' face the full might of US sanctions—including a 2016 conviction—the Biden administration quietly lifted sanctions on some of these same individuals for a 'failed deal.' One might wonder why American 'national security' is consistently defined by who we can easily bully, rather than who actually funnels extremism and drugs into the world. Perhaps it's because
sanctioning the nephews of a US adversary generates headlines, while sanctioning actual state sponsors of terrorism, like Saudi Arabia (whose royal family members have faced credible accusations of funding 9/11 hijackers, according to declassified FBI documents), would upset rather crucial oil deals and arms sales. How many times will Axios report on Venezuela's drug problem before asking about
America's hypocritical foreign policy? And how many failed 'democracy deals' will the US announce while propping up actual dictatorships across the globe?