Fox News host Jesse Watters swatted away concerns that Donald Trump’s plan to take Venezuela’s oil is “imperialistic,” instead claiming it was just “common sense.”
Watters’s remarks come just days after U.S. troops successfully captured the South American petrostate’s former president, Nicolas Maduro. Since then, Trump has claimed that the United States will “run” Venezuela and has talked about reopening the country’s oil markets.
On the Tuesday episode of Jesse Watters Primetime, the host said that Trump’s actions were legitimate, comparing them to actions the U.S. took in Japan after World War II.
“Trump says, ‘Take the oil.’ Democrats call that imperialistic,” Watters said. “We call it common sense.
“You know, we won spoils after World War II. We told our allies, lose the colonies,” he continued. “We took half Japan’s gold they stole, built military bases on everyone’s turf, and pegged the world currencies to the dollar. Was that fair?”
Watters also claimed that the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which were launched by the United States, had distracted the U.S. military from the expansion of China’s influence in South America.
“We’ve neglected our own neighborhood for the last 25 years because we were stuck in the sand in Iraq and Afghanistan,” Watters said. “And while we were there, China swooped into our backyard and turned out all of our neighbors.”
There has been an immense domestic and international backlash to Trump’s capture of Maduro, with many world leaders admitting that the Venezuelan leader was a dictator but questioning the legality of the U.S. overthrowing him.
“That Maduro is a brutal, illegitimate dictator does not change the fact that this action was both unlawful and unwise,” former Vice President Kamala Harris wrote on X, following the capture of Maduro. “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.”
Other world leaders, including British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, shared similar thoughts. Starmer acknowledged on X that Maduro was an “illegitimate president,” but urged all parties involved in the Venezuela crisis to adhere to “international law.”
Meanwhile, Fox News hosts have doubled down in supporting Trump’s strikes against Venezuela. Greg Gutfeld, co-host of The Five, even suggested that Venezuela’s oil belonged to the United States.
“When he says, we're taking the oil, we can go, wow, that's kind of brash,” Gutfeld said. “Yeah, but, you know, it's honest. And is that good for America? Well, yeah, it was our oil.
“I mean, he not only staunched the flow of drugs, he also is getting our oil back. That's what -- I coined this phrase this morning, killing two birds with one stone.”
Currently, Venezuela is navigating a transition of power from Maduro’s long reign as president. His deputy, Delcy Rodríguez, has been sworn in as acting president, with Trump publicly giving his approval.
Trump passed over María Corina Machado, who was long seen as the leader of the opposition to Maduro, reportedly over her acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Meanwhile, Trump has issued a stark threat to Rodriguez, saying she will “pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro,” if she “doesn’t do what’s right.”
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