US President Donald Trump on Tuesday accused Nicolas Maduro of imitating his dancing, among other crimes, as he celebrated the capture of the Venezuelan leader in a freewheeling speech to Republican lawmakers.Trump’s comments come after a New York Times report that Maduro’s regular public dancing in defiance of US threats convinced White House officials that it was time to act.”He gets up there and he tries to imitate my dance a little bit,” Trump told lawmakers at the Kennedy arts center in Washington — which was recently renamed the Trump-Kennedy Center by his handpicked board.”But he’s a violent guy, and he’s killed millions of people. He’s tortured. They have a torture chamber in the middle of Caracas that they’re closing up.” Trump did not give further details about the alleged torture chamber, or elaborate on his so-far vague plans for the United States to “run” oil-rich Venezuela following the fall of Maduro.Leftist Maduro regularly appeared on stage dancing to a techno remix of his mantra “No War, Yes Peace” as US forces massed in the Caribbean in late 2025. Trump is known for dancing to the disco song “Y.M.C.A.” at his rallies.But while Trump hailed the “brilliant” US special forces raid that seized Maduro and his wife on Saturday, most of the speech was about firing the starting gun on the crucial 2026 US midterms.The 79-year-old returned to the theme of his dancing, and other moves, as he ran through a list of his policy priorities ahead of November’s crucial election to decide who holds Congress.- ‘So unpresidential’ – While discussing his administration’s banning of transgender women from women’s and girls’ sports, Trump performed an exaggerated imitation of what he said was a trans weightlifter.”My wife hates when I do this,” Trump said. “She said, ‘it’s so unpresidential.'”Trump added that “she hates it when I dance,” adding: “Could you imagine FDR dancing?”President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was in office from 1933 until 1945, was paralyzed from the waist down by polio in 1921.Trump also referred to the fact that his speech was on the fifth anniversary of the US Capitol attack by supporters irate at what he still falsely calls his “rigged” election loss to Joe Biden in 2020.He was impeached for the second time over the riot — and warned Republicans that the same thing could happen if they do not win this year’s midterm elections.”You got to win the midterms, because if we don’t win… I mean, they’ll find a reason to impeach me,” he said, referring to rival Democrats.Trump pardoned nearly 1,600 January 6 rioters on his first day back in office on January 20, 2025.With the parties of incumbent presidents often taking a beating in midterms, Trump urged Republicans to focus on issues like healthcare and the cost of living.Polls have shown US voters are still concerned about the affordability of basic goods, despite Trump’s claims that the economy is doing well.”I wish you could explain to me what the hell’s going on with the mind of the public. Because we have the right policy,” Trump told the Republican lawmakers.

US forces killed 55 Venezuelan and Cuban military personnel during their stunning raid to capture Nicolas Maduro, tolls published by Caracas and Havana showed Tuesday.In the first confirmation of its losses, Venezuela’s military said 23 of its service members died in Saturday’s attacks by the United States, which led to the ouster of Maduro as the country’s leader. Caracas has yet to give an official figure for civilian casualties.Cuba, which had already announced that 32 members of its armed forces and interior ministry security personnel assigned to duties in Caracas were killed in the raids, also listed its dead.They ranged in age from 26 to 67 and included two colonels and one lieutenant colonel.Many of the dead Cubans are believed to have been members of Maduro’s security detail, which was largely wiped out in the attacks, according to Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez.The assault began with bombing raids on military targets and culminated with US special forces swooping in by helicopter to seize Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores from a compound.They were later taken to New York, where they appeared in court on Monday and pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking and other charges.Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum on Tuesday called on the United States to ensure Maduro receives a “fair trial.”- Interim president’s challenges -Hours after their court appearance, Maduro’s former deputy Delcy Rodriguez was sworn in as interim president.US President Donald Trump said he is willing to work with her, as long as she submits to his demands on providing US companies access to Venezuela’s massive oil reserves.Rodriguez faces a delicate balancing act in trying to respond to those demands while keeping Maduro loyalists on her side.She has sought to project unity with the hardliners in Maduro’s administration, who control the security forces and powerful paramilitaries that have patrolled the streets in the days since the deposed leader’s capture.In a sign that a repressive security apparatus remains in place, 14 journalists and media workers, most of them representing foreign media, were detained while covering the presidential inauguration at parliament on Monday, a journalists’ union said.Two other journalists for foreign media were detained near the Colombian border.All were later released.- Opposition lashes out -Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who has been given no role by Washington in the post-Maduro transition, said in a Fox News interview that Rodriguez was not to be trusted.”Delcy Rodriguez as you know is one of the main architects of torture, persecution, corruption, narcotrafficking,” she said.”She’s the main ally and liaison with Russia, China, Iran, certainly not an individual that could be trusted by international investors.”Trump has so far backed Rodriguez, but warned she would pay “a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro” if she does not comply with Washington’s agenda.So far she has made no changes to the cabinet, with Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello and Padrino Lopez, widely seen as wielding the real power in Venezuela, retaining their posts.- ‘We will win’ -A retired general who held high-ranking positions in the military predicted that Rodriguez would throw open Venezuela to US oil and mining companies and perhaps resume diplomatic ties, broken off by Maduro in 2019.He also believed she would seek to appease criticism of Venezuela’s dire rights record by releasing political prisoners. Trump on Tuesday called Maduro a “violent guy” who “killed millions of people” and whose government engaged in torture.”They have a torture chamber in the middle of Caracas that they are closing up,” he claimed.The constitution says that after Maduro is formally declared absent, elections must then be held within 30 days.Machado told Fox News that “in free and fair elections, we will win by over 90 percent of the votes, I have no doubt about it.”She vowed to “turn Venezuela into the energy hub of the Americas”; “dismantle all these criminal structures” and “bring millions of Venezuelans that have been forced to flee our country back home.”She also offered to give her Nobel prize — an award Trump has long publicly coveted — to the US president.Machado said, however, that she had not spoken to Trump since October 10.

The lawyer defending deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro is a veteran trial attorney who previously represented WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.Barry Pollack, 61, appeared beside Maduro during his arraignment in a New York courtroom on Monday on drug trafficking and other charges.Maduro pleaded not guilty and it will be up to Pollack to try to convince a federal jury to render that verdict when the case eventually goes to trial.The next hearing has been set for March 17.A graduate of Georgetown University law school, Pollack is a partner in Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler LLP, a boutique New York law firm, and a former president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.Law firm research guide Chambers USA describes him as a “thorough and deep-thinking lawyer” who “lives, breathes and sleeps trials, and has such a natural way in front of juries.”In 2024, Pollack secured the release of Assange from a British prison after negotiating a plea deal with the US Justice Department that saw the Australian plead guilty to violating the Espionage Act by unlawfully disclosing national defense material.In another high-profile case, Pollack obtained the acquittal of a former Enron accountant who was facing criminal fraud charges stemming from the collapse of the energy giant.Another prominent case involved a New York man who was wrongfully convicted of murdering his parents when he was a teenager and spent 17 years in prison.Pollack managed to get the charges dismissed and secured his freedom.Pollack gave a hint of his defense strategy during Monday’s brief arraignment of Maduro before District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, questioning the “legality of his abduction” by the US military.