Maduro to make first court appearance since NYC capture as Trump issues stark warning to Venezuela’s interim leader: Live updates

President Donald Trump threatened Venezuela’s new leader with a grim fate far worse than ousted dictator Nicolas Maduro.

Trump, who said just hours after arresting Maduro and his wife in Caracas that he preferred hardline socialist Vice President Delcy Rodriguez as Maduro’s successor rather than the country’s opposition leader, Maria Corina Machado, appeared to change his tune on Sunday morning.

The commander-in-chief warned that if Rodriguez ‘doesn’t do what’s right, she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro,’ Trump told The Atlantic.

Nicolas Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, has been tapped as Venezuela’s interim leader.

Rodriguez is a hardline socialist and Maduro loyalist who has helped him maintain his regime for over a decade.

The US Ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, addressed Nicolas Maduro’s capture at the Security Council meeting on Venezuela on Monday.

‘There is no war against Venezuela or its people. We are not occupying a country. This was a law enforcement operation,’ he said.

‘The overwhelming evidence of his crimes will be presented openly in US court proceedings.’

Waltz defended Donald Trump, insisting he was forced to act after Maduro refused to engage in diplomacy.

‘I want to reiterate that President Trump gave diplomacy a chance. He offered Maduro multiple off-ramps. He tried to de-escalate. Maduro refused to take them,’ he said.

Waltz said the US is committed to ‘[Protecting] Americans from the scourge of narco-terrorism and seeks peace, liberty and justice for the great people of Venezuela.’

Protestors gather outside of the Daniel Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse in New York City as former Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro makes an initial appearance to face US federal charges including narco-terrorism, conspiracy, drug trafficking, money laundering and more.

The Swiss government froze assets held in the country by Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro and his associates on Monday.

A spokesperson for the Swiss Foreign Ministry told Reuters the order affects 37 people, but could not provide any details on the value of the assets in question.

The measure, effective immediately and valid for four years, aims to prevent an outflow of potentially illicit assets and is in addition to the existing sanctions imposed on Venezuela since 2018, the government said.

‘The Federal Council wants to ensure that any illicitly acquired assets cannot be transferred out of Switzerland in the current situation,’ it said.

Nicolas Maduro, 63, and his wife Cilia, 69, are expected to appear before a judge at Manhattan Federal Court for a brief, but required, legal proceeding at 12pm ET.

The couple is facing narco-terrorism, drug and weapon charges that could see them face the death penalty if convicted.

Nicolas Maduro is being represented by Barry J. Pollack, a Washington, DC-based lawyer known for helping to free WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Pollack, a partner at the law firm Harris, St. Laurent & Wechsler, negotiated Assange’s 2024 plea agreement, allowing him to go free immediately after he pleaded guilty to an Espionage Act charge for obtaining and publishing US military secrets.

He also represented former Enron accountant Michael Krautz and won his acquittal.

Krautz was acquitted of federal fraud charges in 2006 after a hung jury the year before.

He was one of the only Enron executives whose case ended in a not-guilty verdict. Nearly two-dozen other executives were convicted of wrongdoing in connection with the energy trading giant’s collapse.

Nicolas Maduro provoked President Trump’s team into action after his dance moves and nonchalance were taken as mockery in recent weeks, sources have claimed.

Former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro sang and danced in the weeks leading up to his capture by US commandos along with his wife Cilia from their compound in Caracas on January 3.

Insiders told The New York Times that the left-wing leader’s flippant antics were an attempt to call what he believed was the Trump administration’s bluff, which ultimately became their breaking point.

Venezuela’s interim leader, Delcy Rodriguez, has hurled threats at Donald Trump after the capture of the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro, who is now languishing in a New York federal jail.

The Supreme Court of Venezuela confirmed hardline socialist Vice President Rodriguez as Maduro’s successor just hours after US forces detained him and his wife, Cilia Flores, on narco-terrorism and drug trafficking charges on Saturday.

Trump said he preferred Rodriguez, 56, in power rather than the country’s opposition leader, Maria Corina Machado, adding that Maduro’s VP was prepared to work with the US.

Captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia were filmed awkwardly shuffling along a helipad as the pair were taken to court in New York City to face drugs charges that could result in their execution.

Maduro, 63, is expected to appear in court Monday on drug and weapons charges that carry the death penalty, just days after being seized in Caracas in a shock US military operation.

The South American leader, who was captured by Delta Force soldiers in Caracas early Saturday, was driven from Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center to a nearby helipad. He was then flown the short distance across the East River to the southern tip of Manhattan.