Trump Reportedly Summoning Top Officials to Oval Office to Discuss ‘Next Steps’ on Venezuela

(AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump is set to gather his top national security officials in the Oval Office on Monday evening for a closed-door “next steps” discussion on Venezuela.

Sources familiar with the matter told CNN that senior figures including Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Dan Caine, Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller are expected at the 5 p.m. (ET) session. It comes as the administration has escalated its regional posture with strikes on suspected drug-trafficking boats in the Caribbean.

Over the weekend, Trump issued a sweeping online directive warning “airlines, pilots and criminal networks” to avoid Venezuelan airspace. And on Capitol Hill, lawmakers have launched parallel House and Senate inquiries into an alleged September 2 “double tap strike” on a Venezuelan vessel.

According to reporting in the Washington Post, Hegseth allegedly issued a verbal order to “kill everybody” on board the suspected narco-terrorist vessel, one in a series of more than a dozen U.S. strikes that have killed over 80 people in three months.

Trump, however, dismissed the allegations when questioned aboard Air Force One on Sunday. “He said he did not say that, and I believe him 100 percent,” the president insisted. “I wouldn’t have wanted that, not a second strike.”

Hegseth has maintained the operations were “lawful under both U.S. and international law.”