Donald Trump Administration Plans To Seize Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's Plane. Here's Why

(MENAFN- Live Mint) The trump administration plans to seize a second plane belonging to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro 's government that is currently in the Dominican Republic.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio intends to announce the seizure on Thursday during a visit to Santo Domingo, the last stop of his five-nation tour of Latin America, according to a U.S. official familiar with the matter and a State Department document obtained by The Associated Press.

Carrying out the seizure required that Rubio sign off on a foreign aid freeze waiver request to pay more than $230,000 in storage and maintenance fees. It also required approval by the U.S. Department of Justice.

That waiver request, submitted early last week, has been approved and Rubio is expected to make the announcement at what the State Department has described publicly as only a“law enforcement engagement.”

The plane is a Dassault Falcon 200 that has been used by Maduro and top aides, including his vice president and defense minister, to travel the world, including visits to Greece, Turkey, Russia and Cuba, in what Washngton says are violations of U.S. sanctions, according to the document.

The seizure of the plane comes just a week after President Donald Trump's envoy for special missions, Richard Grenell, visited Caracas and met with Maduro to discuss the repatriation of Venezuelan nationals who illegally entered the United States. Grenell returned with six Americans who had been detained in Venezuela.

The U.S. seized another of Maduro's planes from the Dominican Republic in September 2024.

At the time, the U.S. Justice Department said Maduro associates in late 2022 and early 2023 used a Caribbean-based shell company to hide their involvement in the purchase of the plane - a Dassault Falcon 900EX valued at $13 million - from a company in Florida.

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