The MeidasTouch Podcast

Podbit · The MeidasTouch Podcast

Trump Attacks Venezuela after Disaster

Explore episode Jul 1, 2026

Where this was said

Venezuela Earthquake Overview: Death Toll, Scale, and Trump's Role

At 3:12 · chapter starts 2:30

Ben Meiselas wastes no time setting the scene: all hell has broken loose in Venezuela following twin earthquakes on June 24 that struck north-central Venezuela 39 seconds apart — a 7.2 followed almost immediately by a devastating 7.5. With roughly 2,000 confirmed dead, over 10,000 injured, and tens of thousands still missing, the humanitarian scale is staggering. Meiselas frames Trump's behavior not as incompetence but as deliberate alignment with authoritarian interim leader Delcy Rodriguez and her enforcer Diosdado Cabello, who are blocking aid and rescue operations. Trump, he argues, is supporting Delcy because he wants Venezuela's oil money — claiming credit for $100 million in aid while allegedly extracting over $5 billion in oil revenue from the country. Meanwhile, legitimate opposition leader María Corina Machado — who was forced to surrender her Nobel Peace Prize to Trump — is being blocked from even returning to her earthquake-ravaged country. Meiselas positions this as a pattern of authoritarian enablement, calling Trump 'the worst authoritarian of them all right now.'

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