As cable news pundits meltdown and House Democrats rage over President Trump’s recent operation against Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, Bill O’Reilly delivered a no-nonsense breakdown of the events — and why the mainstream media’s narrative of “illegality” is completely misleading.
O’Reilly began by addressing the media frenzy directly.
O’REILLY: “What hasn’t been reported, though, and I’ve been watching and the other networks and I can tell anybody watching right now that you’re lucky to be on NewsNation because they’re just CLUELESS, most of these pundits.”
He brought up how many outlets rush to criticize Trump without understanding the legal and historical context of the operation.
The key, O’Reilly explained, lies in the designation of a Venezuelan criminal organization as a terrorist entity.
“So in November, November 24th to be exact, the Trump administration declared that a group called Cartel de los Soles was a terrorist group.”
He noted the cartel’s wide-ranging criminal activities:
“That group traffics in narcotics. It traffics in oil, illegal oil to places like Iran…does a lot of bad things.”
This designation, he said, provided the Trump administration with clear authority to take military action.
“Now, under the United States government, if you designate an organization a terrorist, you can attack it with military.”
O’Reilly then took direct aim at the Democrat blowhards who claimed Trump acted unilaterally.
“So there’s no…as Jeffries and the Democrats who hate everything that Trump does, goes running around going, well you didn’t consult Congress.”
He made the legal reality crystal clear: “Well, you don’t have to.”
To put the operation in historical perspective, O’Reilly reminded viewers of precedent.
“And the precedent was set by Bush the elder in 1989 when he took out Manuel Noriega in Panama, in EXACTLY the same kind of operation.”
He stressed that similar executive actions have long been accepted in U.S. foreign policy.
“People forget that. 21,000 American troops went to Panama, they arrested Noriega, took him to Miami, he was convicted of narcotics trafficking and he never got out of prison.”
O’Reilly also pointed out the double standard in the media coverage.
While Democrats and liberal commentators portray the operation as illegal, past presidents have carried out identical military actions with little scrutiny. Trump, O’Reilly argued, is being held to a standard that no previous leader has faced.
For everyone trying to cut through the headlines, O’Reilly’s message was simple: the operation was lawful, Trump followed established precedent, and the media’s portrayal of him as overstepping his authority is flat out wrong.
As critics continue to frame the story as a partisan battle, O’Reilly unearthed the glaringly obvious underlying reality that the administration acted decisively against a violent, internationally-connected criminal organization.
The law, history, and precedent all support the move — even if much of the media and Democrat Party refuse to acknowledge it.
