A few weeks ago, President Trump moved a battle group to Latin America. Now, with the bombing of a Venezuelan cartel drug smuggling boat, we’ve seen what part of its mission may be. But Glenn Beck lays out an unreported second reason that Trump is drawing these battle lines: Venezuela has become a literal “beachhead” for enemies of America, like China, Hezbollah, and Iran.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: I want to talk to you about something that is right on our door step, that I don't think a lot of people are watching. I think it was Sunday. Saturday or Sunday. I read an article. And I just kind of skimmed it quickly.

And I filed it away.

And it was the United States is moving like a battle group, to Latin America. And I'm like, what? We're moving a battle group? What are we -- what -- we're losing.

We're moving cruise missiles, ships, like 4,000 Marines. I mean, this is what you have, when you have an invading force. You know, when you're worried about something, you want to keep calm in some area. You know, we sent them over, off the coast of Africa. Because there's somebody doing something.

And we sent this group over.

Like, hey. Knock it off. What are we doing?

Okay. Well, it's not just to Latin America. It's some place very specific: Venezuela.

What's happening now is not some distant strong man. This is -- battle lines are being drawn right now, between freedom and chaos. Okay?

This week, Nicholas Maduro, who was indicted by the Trump administration. I think in 2020. And then Biden didn't do anything about it. He was indicted by our own justice department for narco terrorism.

He just responded to us. And mobilized four and a half million civilian militiamen. So he's now just kind of drafting 4 million men, and said, you're -- you're a citizen, but you're also a soldier right now.

And he says, it's to defend sovereignty against America.

Here's what it is: He's trying to protect himself.

He's a dictator. And he's conscripting an entire had a nation. Because he knows, the United States is after him. Why?

Why?

Well, we have warships, three ageist destroyers, and they're anchored right off his coast. And we just doubled the on bounty on his head, from $25 million to $50 million.

And, you know, you -- at first blush, you're like, can we?

What are we doing? What? What's happening?

We've lived in a time, my whole life, where we're like, you know, the government can do two things at one place.

It should be able to walk and chew gum. Well, we're not just walking and chewing gum. We're walking, chewing gum, putting out the fire of a burning house. Juggling flaming bowling pins. Stopping a nuclear war.

Dancing the Macarena, because everybody in Washington, DC, is like 8,000 years old. We're building a death bot army at the same time, fighting people that want to behead us. Oh, and the Islamists, and redistricting Texas. And we're doing it all at the same time.

Why? I mean, we're living Mission Impossible, except our Tom Cruise is 78 years old. Which, I want you to think about this.

I think Donald Trump is exactly who Tom Cruise will be when he's 78. Just not -- he's still running that weird run that he's doing. Anyway, so Donald Trump is going after Venezuela for two reasons. One, drums. Fentanyl and cocaine, much of it laced, much of it deadly. And it is -- it is being trafficked here in the United States, by people who are directly tied to Maduro's government.

And it's the so-called cartel of the suns. MS-13 gang members. All of this stuff is coming from Venezuela.

And they are poisoning Americans. And this is not just a foreign, you know -- you know, a foreign security thing. Or a foreign policy issue.

This is -- this is Homeland Security. This is actually affecting us.

The second one, and I think this is the bigger reason of the two. I mean, they're probably tied. But this is a big one that most Americans don't know. Venezuela is not some backwater place. It's full of oil.

And it is a staging ground now for Russia, China, and Iran.

Hezbollah, it has some of the worst people. It's a beachhead, for those people who want to see the United States taken down.

JASON: Oh, Glenn. Literally, a beachhead. This is insane because I didn't even know a lot of this. We mentioned this maybe a couple of months ago.

GLENN: Yeah, we did -- we did -- it was part of another story.

JASON: The Tren de Aragua stuff.

GLENN: Yeah. Wait a minute. What is Hezbollah doing in Venezuela?

JASON: Oh, my gosh. So I actually did you go through congressional testimony, to get some of this information now. Now, this is information that the American public doesn't really know, but the government knows.

So check this out. This is from congressional testimony. In 2011, they tested -- Congress testified what Hugo Chavez was doing.

Listen to this. Just the year before, 2010, Hugo Chavez hosted something called the Secret Summit. Like literally, it was called the Secret Summit.

GLENN: Okay.

JASON: Guess who showed up to the Secret Summit. The supreme leader of Hamas. The Chief of Operations for Hezbollah, and the Secretary General of Palestinian Islamic jihad.

GLENN: Oh, I thought you were going to say Satan.

JASON: I might as well have. I mean, this is absolutely nuts.

GLENN: Nobody was talking about that. How can that happen right off our shore? Nobody is talking about it.

JASON: Glenn, it gets so much worse than that, if it can.

So Iranians right now, with connections to Hezbollah, are on an island off the coast of Venezuela. It's called Margarita Island. Everybody should Google us right now, and check it out.

GLENN: Is Jimmy Buffett involved?

JASON: He's -- Jimmy Buffett would be nowhere near this.

GLENN: All right. The whole world is about to crash.

JASON: Yeah, it's not 5 o'clock anywhere on this Margarita Island.

These are some of the things they're doing here, okay?

Again, with the involvement of the -- of the Venezuelan government. They are, quote, running money laundering operations, establishing -- excuse me. Paramilitary training centers.

They are recruiting Venezuelan gangs. And listen to this: Sending those people -- this is like Tren de Aragua. Sending them to Iran for follow-on training.

GLENN: Jeez.

JASON: This is happening right now. Our government knows about this. This is the only time I've actually seen them do anything concrete to combat it.

GLENN: They've known about it since 2010. Known about it since 2010.

You didn't know that. Nobody is saying that. When -- you know, we've -- we've argued that Venezuela and communism. And, you know, they were eating the zoo animals.

That's what happens, gang.

When you go communist. And full-on democracy. They wanted full-on democracy. And that's what you get. You know, hello, Maduro.

So when Maduro took over, he was kind of the Mamdani, if you will of -- of Venezuela. He's just a simple bus driver. Uh-huh.

And look what -- look what he's done.

That's the part we've heard about.

Then when the border crisis happened. We started hearing about, oh, well, they're sending gangs in. And they're sending -- they're sending fentanyl and everything else in.

We still are not talking about their connections to Iran and Hezbollah. And how they have been training people. And sending them here!

This is really not good.

So Donald Trump clearly knows all of this stuff.

And that's why he's offered $50 million. For anybody that will turn him in.

Or can tip us off to lead to the capture.

And now, the reason we're doing that. You've got to remember. We've done this before.

Noriega. Was a guy who was a drug lord.

And he was running a country. And so we've got to get him. And we finally did get Noriega. And he went to prison for what he did.

But the other times we've done that, Saddam Hussein, and even worse Muammar Gaddafi, that was a Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama nightmare.

And they drug his body through the streets.
Because we assisted the collapse. And it became a vacuum!

And now, Libya is just a nightmare.

Just a nightmare.

So was Iraq. We can't let that happen to Venezuela.

So we have to be very careful. You can't just say, go get them. We have to be very careful.

Unless the people themselves rise up against Maduro. Unless the people themselves do it, this is going to be -- this is going to be a tough one.

But we have to stop pretending, that this is somebody else's problem.

Because it is our problem. It really is our problem. Those people are already here. And we are also -- you know, this is one of the reasons insular like it, when people blame their problems on others.

I'm an alcoholic.

Now, everybody says, well, that -- that's a familial thing. That runs in your genes. I don't know. I don't think they've ever found that. There's no evidence of that. But you make a good case. I mean, we're riddled with alcoholism in my family. So, yeah. Maybe! Maybe! But I'm the one who makes the choice. Okay?

Yeah. Maybe I have that extra gene that's working against me. Maybe! But I went in to the bar. I went in to the store and bought the booze.

So we -- we have to start taking responsibility for some of our problems. It's easy to say, Venezuela is shipping all this fentanyl into the United States.

We have to recognize that Americans are buying it. Now, there's one thing to say about addiction. Once you start buying it, then you're addicted to it. And it is a nightmare.

I mean, the first time I had fentanyl, I -- I wake up. I've woken up on the operating table, two times.

They cannot keep me down. My body just processes stuff like, so fast. It's a fast, high-functioning liver.

And I was in pain. You might remember this, if you've listened to me, for a long time.

I was in New York. And they put me under. And then they -- I got out. And they were giving me morphine. I think Percocet.

And fentanyl patches. And my doctor after said, why would you let somebody do this to you?

And I was like, well, I was a little high.

And my wife didn't know.

We listened to the doctor. That's when we really learned: Don't listen to the doctor. Yeah, they don't always know.

But they had good intent. They were just trying to keep me out of pain.

But the box. Fentanyl.

I don't know if it still does.

If you get a box of fentanyl from the drugstore.

It says, black box, warning for end of life use only. Why?

Because it is so incredibly addicting.
You take it for a day or two, and you're done. You're addicted to it.

So addiction is one thing that we have to deal with.

But we also have to say, Americans are buying this stuff!

We have to change our culture, and start prosecuting people who are buying this stuff.

And treating those who are addicted to it, and understanding with compassion. Yada, yada, yada.

But we have to also -- if you're selling drugs, you're involved in selling drugs, you should have a very, very long sentence. Very long sentence.

You know, don't tell Donald Trump this. But, you know, China does not have a drug problem.

Because if you sell drugs, you're executed. I don't even think you get a trial. They just kill you.

Let's not tell Donald Trump that, because he might like that idea.

But fix it quickly.

Fix it quickly.

But we -- we have to take responsibility ourself. We have to be resilient as people. In our communities.

We have to have strong families.

We have to have citizenry, that knows the difference between liberty and tyranny. We have to understand that freedom does not come when you're on drugs.

It doesn't. That is the worst tyranny. You're a pharmaceutical tyranny.

You are -- air slave to whatever it is, that you're putting into your body. That's the real battle.

But there is another one off our shore. That could -- what do you think is going to happen, Jason?

Because this is a significant battle group, isn't it?

JASON: It's significant. I mean, including 4,000 Marines. I was on a battle group like that, where this is the same kind. Where we would go and sit off the coast of a Middle Eastern country.

GLENN: Yeah. Weren't you off the coast of Australia? You were one of the first in after 911.

JASON: Yeah. Yeah. In one of these battle groups, doing exercises in Australia. We got the call and went straight to Afghanistan right after that.

So this is like the firepower that could do that. So it's very intimidating. I would assume that is the reason for this. I don't think they will be doing actual -- you know, conflict-type kinetic stuff.

But I bet that it's just supposed to mean -- it's supposed to be intimidating. I'm curious if it's supposed to lend some support to maybe some of the, you know, ground people in Venezuela.

To finally tell them, look, we've got your back. If you want to, you know, do something about this, and finally take your country back. Now would be the time.

GLENN: Yeah, maybe we would be a peacekeeper. You know, maybe we would be a peace-keeping force.