Early on Saturday morning, Donald Trump announced that US forces had captured the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores. Hours later, they were indicted on drug and weapons offences in New York. Later on Saturday, he suggested that the US was “going to run” the country for the time being
Jonathan Freedland speaks to the Guardian’s Latin America correspondent, Tom Phillips, about whether or not Trump is likely to end his military campaign in the region – or if this is just the beginning
Not clear whether more people will get the flu this season, but more than 3,100 people have died in last year in US
The United States has seen the number of influenza cases climb significantly in December, coming after the most severe flu season since 2018, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said.
It’s not yet clear whether there will be an increase in the total number of people who get the flu this season – or whether more people just got it at once in December – but more than 3,100 people died from the virus in the US in the year ending August 2025, according to the latest data from the CDC.
As they were jolted from their beds just before 2am on Saturday, many Caracas residents sought an innocent explanation for the racket that had interrupted their sleep: an exploding air conditioning unit, a tropical thunderstorm, an earthquake. Or perhaps a festive display of pyrotechnics over Venezuela’s mountain-flanked capital.
“I thought it might be fireworks,” Carlos Hurtado, a resident of the 23 de Enero housing estate on the city’s west side, recalled of the moment he was woken by a mysterious sequence of rumblings and explosions.
Nicolás Maduro, a former bus driver and union activist, rose from humble origins to rule Venezuela for 13 years and eight months before being unceremoniously ousted on Saturday by US special forces who seized the 63-year-old leader and flew him out of the country.
For years Maduro had accused the US government of seeking to undermine the supposed socialist revolution that his late mentor and predecessor, Hugo Chávez, ushered in in 1999. Now in the custody of US authorities, he will face indictment on narcotics charges and a potentially long prison sentence.
Donald Trump has announced that US forces 'captured' the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and have flown them out of the country. The US has carried out an overnight strike across the region with explosions rocking the capital, Caracas, before dawn
The novelty of eating at a diner owned by the richest person in the world seems to have worn off in just a few months
Less than six months since it opened, Elon Musk’s Tesla Diner has the feel of a ghost town. Gone is the Optimus robot serving popcorn, gone are the carnivore-diet-inspired “Epic Bacon” strips, gone are the hours-long, hundred-person lines wrapped around the block. Even the restaurant’s all-star chef, Eric Greenspan, is gone. The Hollywood burger-and-fries shop seems like a shell of the bustling eatery it was when it opened in late July.
On a balmy Friday afternoon in December, the parking lot for Tesla car charging was, at best, half full. Inside what the company describes as a “retro-futuristic” diner, a handful of people trickled in, ordering burgers and hotdogs or asking for merch. The upstairs deck, AKA “Skypad”, was vacant except for a pair of employees stringing holiday lights. More staff was busy at work, buffing fingerprints off the chrome walls and taking out the trash, than there were customers. The diner was spotless.
Trump is no longer bending the rules – he is demolishing them, with consequences far beyond Caracas
Hardly anyone expected 2026 to be a year of peace, and it was barely two days old when the worst fears were confirmed.
The overnight strikes on Venezuela, the abduction of its leader, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, and Donald Trump’s declaration that the US would “run” the country and sell its oil, have driven another truck through international law and global norms. But that is not even the most concerning thing about it.
The world will be anxious, and rightly so. For a man so bent on a peace prize, Trump appears to revel in conflict
The overthrow and reported capture by invading US forces of Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela’s hardline socialist president, will send a shiver of fear and consternation around the world. The coup is illegal, unprovoked and regionally and globally destabilising. It upends international norms, ignores sovereign territorial rights, and potentially creates an anarchic situation inside Venezuela itself.
It is chaos made policy. But this is the world we now live in – the world according to Donald Trump.
Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator
New documents reveal numerous missed opportunities as experts and victims condemn US authorities’ failures
Over the course of two decades, Jeffrey Epstein repeatedly appeared on law enforcement’s radar for sexual misconduct involving teen girls and young women. And over this same period of time, Epstein avoided serious and meaningful punishment for his crimes.
The US justice department’s recent disclosure of long-secret investigative files related to Epstein has once again raised the question of why he wasn’t interdicted sooner, despite numerous reports of misconduct. The issue has been the subject of many conspiracy theories, often focusing on the idea that Epstein – who lived at the center of a network of powerful people – enjoyed some form of protection.
The US president, Donald Trump, has said the US will ‘run’ Venezuela after its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, were captured and taken to New York, hours after a “large-scale” pre-dawn assault on Caracas and the surrounding region. Here is what we know so far:
Donald Trump said “We’re going to run the country [Venezuela] until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition” during a press conference about the attack on Venezuela. He has not given details.
A plane carrying Maduro and Flores landed in New York on Saturday evening and they were expected to be transported to appear in Manhattan federal court, possibly as soon as Monday.
The US is going to be “very strongly involved” in Venezuela’s oil industry after the military operation, Trump said. He said: “We have the greatest oil companies in the world, the biggest, the greatest, and we’re going to be very much involved in it.”
Trump posted a photograph of Maduro on his Truth Social platform. It appeared to show the captured Venezuelan president in handcuffs, wrap-around sun goggles and headphones.
The UN security council is due to hold an emergency meeting on Monday.
Trump said his administration had not spoken to Venezuela’s exiled opposition leader María Corina Machado. He said he did not think she would be able to return to lead Venezuela, saying: “She does not have the support in Venezuela. She is a very nice woman but she does not have the support.”
The constitutional chamber of Venezuela’s supreme court has ordered vice president Delcy Rodríguez to assume the role of acting president in Maduro’s absence.
Trump was asked about Cuba during the press conference on Venezuela. He said “Cuba, as you know, is not doing very well right now. That system has not been a very good one for Cuba. The people there have suffered for many, many years and I think Cuba is going to be something we’ll end up talking about, because Cuba is a failing nation right now.”
The US Department of Justice released a new indictment against Nicolás Maduro, including his wife, Celia Flores, his son and others.
The US vice-president, JD Vance, hailed what he called a “truly impressive operation”. Resharing Trump’s post about the action, Vance wrote: “The president offered multiple off-ramps, but was very clear throughout this process: the drug trafficking must stop, and the stolen oil must be returned to the United States.”
In a statement on X, the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said Maduro was “under indictment for pushing drugs in the United States”. The Republican senator Mike Lee said on Saturday that Rubio had told him he “anticipates no further action in Venezuela now that Maduro is in US custody”.
The UN secretary general, António Guterres, is deeply alarmed by US military action in Venezuela, his spokesperson has said, and considered the US intervention “a dangerous precedent”.
Colombia has mobilised its armed forces in the aftermath of US strikes on neighbouring Venezuela. President Gustavo Petro said Colombia was concerned about refugees fleeing in the aftermath of the attacks.
Petro posted on X that his government had held a national security meeting in which it was decided that forces should be sent to the border amid a potential “massive influx” of people leaving Venezuela.
The US carried out airstrikes across Venezuela overnight on Friday, with explosions rocking the capital, Caracas, before dawn. Shortly afterwards, Donald Trump announced that US forces had captured the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flown them out of the country.
The US attorney general, Pam Bondi, said they would face trial in New York on charges of involvement in narco-terrorism. A fresh indictment was issued on Saturday.
The state has created the first registry in the US to track repeat domestic violence offenders
Let’s say you’re going on a first date and you want to make sure the person you’re meeting up with isn’t a registered sex offender. If you live in the US, you can find this out very quickly: there’s a centralized website provided by the US Department of Justice that lets you search a name or location in seconds.
Donald Trump has saidthe US “captured” Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flew them out of the South American country during a pre-dawn assault on Caracas and the surrounding region.
“It was a brilliant operation, actually,” the US president told the New York Times after witnesses in Venezuela reported a series of explosions. “A lot of good planning and [a] lot of great, great troops and great people.”
As explosions hit Caracas, the Venezuelan government confirmed attacks had been made on the capital, as well as three other states: Miranda, La Guaira and Aragua. Donald Trump claimed the US had 'captured' Venezuela’s dictator, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flown them out of the South American country
The US may be making positive noises, but exhausted Ukrainians remain wary after nearly four years of war
“I would give anything in the world if, in this address, I could say that peace will also come in just a few minutes,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a message to the Ukrainian people released just before midnight on New Year’s Eve. “Unfortunately, I cannot say that yet.”
Zelenskyy said a peace agreement was “90% ready”, but added something that subverted Donald Trump’s constant claims that a deal is just around the corner. “Those 10% contain, in fact, everything,” he said.
The Reuters news agency says it has been told by a US official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, that the US carried out strikes inside Venezuela on Saturday.
The unnamed official did not provide details. As mentioned earlier, the White House and Pentagon did not immediately respond to request for comment on Saturday morning.
Years of scandal and disappointment have left a void in our politics. But New York’s new mayor offers an alternative to more apathy: hope
On 1 January, to mark his inauguration as mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani threw a block party. As he was sworn in outside city hall in front of a crowd of a few thousand of us, a nearby street in Manhattan was closed to traffic so that tens of thousands more could gather to watch the historic moment live on enormous screens. The weather – a cloudless blue sky and arctic winds – felt somehow fitting: a licence to dream and a warning against complacency.
Mayors don’t usually take office amid such a festival atmosphere. A smaller, more exclusive event is normally adequate. But a key feature of Mamdani’s rise has been the desire for mass participation in politics. There was no chance this day was going to pass without an open-invitation party.
Ninth circuit sides with gun owner that ban in counties with more than 200,000 people violates second amendment
A US appeals court on Friday ruled that California’s ban on openly carrying firearms in most parts of the state was unconstitutional.
A panel of the San Francisco-based ninth US circuit court of appeals sided 2-1 with a gun owner in ruling that the state’s prohibition against open carry in counties with more than 200,000 people violated the US constitution’s second amendment right to keep and bear arms.
Kentucky woman reportedly ordered medication to end her pregnancy and buried remains in her yard
A Kentucky woman is facing multiple criminal charges after she allegedly induced her own abortion using medication.
Kentucky state police arrested the woman, Melinda S Spencer, 35, on charges of fetal homicide in the first degree, abuse of a corpse and tampering with physical evidence, according to a local Kentucky news outlet. Spencer reportedly ordered medication online to end her pregnancy, then buried the remains of her pregnancy in her backyard.
In politics, clothes matter – as the mid-market formal wear favoured by the new, young New York mayor testifies
Growing up in London in the 00s, I was surrounded by suits. On City boys darting around the Square Mile. In Hyde Park, where Arab dads in baggy suits kicked footballs with their children in honeyed light. At school, where cheap grey suits were our uniform. The suit has always been a costume of seriousness that signals powerfulness and performance; all the things I was apparently supposed to want if I ever intended to become a “man”. But until recently, my generation seemed to wear them less and less, and they had all but disappeared from my consciousness.
Then came the newly elected New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani, who was sworn in at a private ceremony dressed in a sober black overcoat, crisp white shirt and an Eri silk tiefrom New Delhi-based designer Kartik Kumra of Kartik Research – styled by US fashion editor, Gabriella Karefa-Johnson. Buoyed up by an ingenious campaign, he caught the imagination of the world like no other New York mayoral candidate of recent times. But whether he was throwing his hands in the air at a hip-hop club or at a premiere party for the film Marty Supreme, one thing on his campaign trail rarely changed: he was almost always in a suit. Loosely tailored, modern with soft shoulders, yet conventional and ordinary, his is a typically middle-class millennial suit – well, as typical as it can be for a generation that rarely bothers to wear one.
Executive chair Richard Baker to replace Marc Metrick after company misses $100m interest payment on debt
Saks Global said on Friday that its CEO, Marc Metrick, has stepped down and named executive chair, Richard Baker, as his successor, amid reports that the luxury retailer is preparing for bankruptcy.
The change at the top comes days after the Wall Street Journal reported that the Neiman Marcus parent company is preparing for bankruptcy after missing an interest payment exceeding $100m on debt from its Neiman merger.
FBI says teen was planning Islamic State-inspired hammer and knife attack on Jews, Christians and LGBTQ+ people
The FBI has said it thwarted an alleged plot to carry out a New Year’s Eve terrorist attack on a grocery store and restaurant in North Carolina in support of the Islamic State (IS).
Christian Sturdivant, 18, of Mint Hill – a town outside Charlotte – was arrested on 31 December as he was being released from a special medical facility. He was charged with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, the US attorney for the western district of North Carolina, Russ Ferguson, said at a press conference on Friday morning.
These malign figures will do anything to avoid paying for the harm they have done, but accountability must eventually come to both
It’s not quite a new year resolution, and it’s certainly not a prediction. Think of it instead as a hope or even a plea for the next 12 months. May the coming year see those leaders who have done so much damage to their own countries, and far beyond, at last be called to account. Let 2026 be a year of reckoning.
Start with the man whose reach is longest, by dint of the mighty power he wields. Such is the nature of the US electoral system that Donald Trump, who returned to power less than a year ago, will face the judgment of voters in 10 months’ time. His name will not be on the ballot but, make no mistake, the midterm elections of 3 November will deliver a verdict on the second Trump presidency.
Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist
Guardian newsroom: Year One of Trumpism: Is Britain Emulating the US?
On Wednesday 21 January 2026, join Jonathan Freedland, Tania Branigan and Nick Lowles as they reflect on the first year of Donald Trump’s second presidency – and to ask if Britain could be set on the same path.
Book ticketshere or at guardian.live
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