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Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Law with June Grosseol from Bloomberg Radio.

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Speaker 2: The Illegitimate Dictator Maduro was the king vin of Avas

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Speaker 2: criminal network responsible for trafficking colossal amounts of deadly and

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Speaker 2: elicited drugs into the United States.

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Speaker 1: President Donald Trump announced the stunning middle of the night

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Speaker 1: military operation that captured now ousted Venezuelan president Nicholas Maduro

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Speaker 1: and his wife, who now faced charges in a narco

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Speaker 1: terrorism case in a Manhattan federal court. It will be

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Speaker 1: an extraordinary legal battle with major geopolitical ramifications, but little

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Speaker 1: was said about Maduro or the drug trafficking charges during

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Speaker 1: the nearly hour long press conference on Saturday. The focus

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Speaker 1: was on the running of Venezuela and on oil.

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Speaker 2: Well, we're going to be running it with a group,

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Speaker 2: and we're going to make sure it's run properly. We're

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Speaker 2: going to rebuild the oil infrastructure, which of course billions

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Speaker 2: of dollars. It'll be paid for by the oil companies directly.

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Speaker 2: They will be reimbursed for what they're doing, but it's

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Speaker 2: going to be paid and we're going to get the

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Speaker 2: oil flowing the way it should be. As you know,

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Speaker 2: it was just a minor flow. It is actually a

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Speaker 2: minor flow for what they have.

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Speaker 1: During an initial court appearance on Monday, both Maduro and

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Speaker 1: his wife pleaded not guilty to the charges. Maduro was defiant, saying,

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Speaker 1: I am a kidnapped president. I am a prisoner of war.

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Speaker 1: My guest is former federal prosecutor Jimmy Garula, a professor

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Speaker 1: at Notre Dame Law School. Jimmy. Initially, defense attorneys are

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Speaker 1: going to challenge the legality of the court's jurisdiction over Maduro,

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Speaker 1: if his capture breached international law cannot be used as

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Speaker 1: the grounds to avoid prosecution.

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Speaker 3: Well, it's a good question.

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Speaker 4: I think the invasion of Venezuela both violates US constitutional

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Speaker 4: law and international law. From a constitutional law perspective, this

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Speaker 4: was an active war, you know, the invasion of Venezuela,

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Speaker 4: the toppling of their president is apprehension. I think the

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Speaker 4: bombing of Caracas, I think upwards of thirty or more

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Speaker 4: of President maduro security guards were killed.

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Speaker 3: I think it's clearly an active war.

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Speaker 4: And the Constitution is very clear that Congress must give

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Speaker 4: authority for this type of action, and Congress did not.

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Speaker 4: I mean, Congress was made aware of this action as

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Speaker 4: was taking place or shortly after it took place. So

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Speaker 4: I think that there's an issue, an issue there with

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Speaker 4: respect to international law. I think there's two important aspects

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Speaker 4: to that. One is the illegality, but the other is

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Speaker 4: a criminality. I think it's both an illegal act and

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Speaker 4: a criminal act under the UN Charter, specifically Article two,

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Speaker 4: Section four are prohibited from exercising the use of force

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Speaker 4: within the territory of another states to impact the political

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Speaker 4: independence of that state. So it's a violation of the

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Speaker 4: UN Charter. But I think, perhaps even more importantly, I

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Speaker 4: think it's a crime of aggression. So the crime of aggression,

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Speaker 4: I mean it's an international crime. It was first prosecuted

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Speaker 4: by the Nuremberg Tribunal following World War Two, and it

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Speaker 4: was labeled a quote supreme international crime end quote. So

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Speaker 4: it's the most serious criminal act of aggression, and the

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Speaker 4: crime of aggression is a crime within the jurisdiction of

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Speaker 4: the International Criminal Court. So what I wonder there is

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Speaker 4: whether or not the international law criminal law aspects of

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Speaker 4: this act of invasion would rise to the level of

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Speaker 4: a due process challenge under the Fifth Amendment. The argument

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Speaker 4: would be that it shocks the conscience. You know, for

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Speaker 4: the US military to go into a foreign country in

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Speaker 4: the manner that it did. You again, thirty or more

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Speaker 4: of the president of Maduro security guards bombing the capital city.

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Speaker 4: Does that shock the conscience? Is this something that the

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Speaker 4: court should say, we don't want to have anything to

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Speaker 4: do with, you know, we don't want to explicitly or

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Speaker 4: implicitly support this kind of government action moving forward, and therefore,

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Speaker 4: you know, we're going to dismiss the case on those grounds.

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Speaker 5: It hasn't.

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Speaker 1: The Supreme Court, though, held that criminal defendants generally can't

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Speaker 1: challenge federal court's authority to preside over their cases by

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Speaker 1: arguing that they were brought to the US illegally.

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Speaker 4: That's true. That's true. So there has been, you know,

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Speaker 4: court rulings to that effect. That's simply the fact that

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Speaker 4: you were brought to the country, that you're apprehended in

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Speaker 4: the foreign country and brought to the jurisdiction of the

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Speaker 4: United States in that manner does not support a due

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Speaker 4: process violation.

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Speaker 3: But I think their degrees of action.

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Speaker 4: Here, So there's one thing about surreptitious maybe having agents

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Speaker 4: of the government go into a foreign country, snatch the defendant,

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Speaker 4: remove him from the country, bring him to the United States.

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Speaker 4: It's another thing and a much greater degree of misconduct

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Speaker 4: and illegality to go into the country with military force,

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Speaker 4: you know, bomb the country, kill government security agents, kill civilians.

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Speaker 4: And then in addition to that, say that, as Trump

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Speaker 4: has we're going to run the country for the foreseeable future.

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Speaker 4: We're going to control the petroleum industry, and we're going

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Speaker 4: to control that. And so there we kind of move

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Speaker 4: to an actual kind of occupation of the country. So

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Speaker 4: I think that degree of conduct makes this case particularly unique,

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Speaker 4: even unique from what we've seen in the past. Let's say,

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Speaker 4: with the General Noriega case and the invasion of Panama.

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Speaker 4: I mean, so you know that has been raised as well. Look,

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Speaker 4: you know, the US went in to Panama, they rest

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Speaker 4: in General Noriega, and that was appelled by the courts

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Speaker 4: and no harm, no foul, I mean, it wasn't struck down.

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Speaker 4: Noriego was prosecuted, and none of the legal defenses raised

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Speaker 4: prevailed in the Noriega case. But here I think there

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Speaker 4: are some similarities, but there are some differences. And I

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Speaker 4: think one major difference here is where the Trump administration

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Speaker 4: is saying we're going to run the country.

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Speaker 3: That wasn't the case in Panama.

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Speaker 4: You know, the Bush administration put a person in place

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Speaker 4: who was the opposition leader of the country. That person

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Speaker 4: ran the country, not the United States, and the United

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Speaker 4: States didn't take takeover natural resources the way that the

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Speaker 4: president is proposing to be done in this particular case.

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Speaker 1: I noticed that at the press conference even Secretary of

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Speaker 1: State Rubio is saying something different than what President Trump

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Speaker 1: is saying. But we'll see what actually happens now. There's

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Speaker 1: also the defense might challenge the court's jurisdiction based on

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Speaker 1: head of state immunity, and of course.

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Speaker 4: That defense failed in the Noriega case. But nor Diego

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Speaker 4: was was it a facto head of state? He wasn't

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Speaker 4: the elected, you know, head of state, and here Madudo was,

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Speaker 4: even though of course there are substantial claims that it

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Speaker 4: was a fraudulent election and he isn't the truly elected

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Speaker 4: head of state.

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Speaker 3: So I think that's going to be an issue.

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Speaker 4: It's going to be a thorny issue, and that one

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Speaker 4: I'm not confident that defense lawyers are going to prevail

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Speaker 4: on that claim.

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Speaker 1: Is there any place here at all for the Supreme

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Speaker 1: Court's opinion that President Trump, you know, American presidents are

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Speaker 1: immune from criminal prosecution for official actions while in office.

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Speaker 4: Well, I think it's certainly an argument that the defense

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Speaker 4: is going to raise. I'm going to say, well, look,

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Speaker 4: even the United States Supreme Court has held that its

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Speaker 4: own president is immune for prosecution for official acts while

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Speaker 4: serving in office. The counter argument is going to be, well,

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Speaker 4: drug trafficking isn't an official act, trafficking and weapons isn't

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Speaker 4: an official act, and therefore immunity doesn't extend to that

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Speaker 4: type of contact, that type of criminal conduct. But I

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Speaker 4: think at the end, what we're going to see is

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Speaker 4: that there are a number of very complex legal issues

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Speaker 4: that are going to be raised by Maduro's defense lawyers

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Speaker 4: that are going to delay the jury trial for months

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Speaker 4: and months to come.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and another thing, So Trump orders this operation to

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Speaker 1: capture Maduro just a few weeks after he pardoned the

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Speaker 1: former Honduran president Wan Orlando Hernandez, who'd been convicted in

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Speaker 1: court on similar drug trafficking charges. So can the defense

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Speaker 1: use that and argue perhaps elective prosecution.

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Speaker 4: Well, I think it certainly undermines the president's claim that

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Speaker 4: this was solely a law enforcement action, that the motivation

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Speaker 4: was simply to bring to justice this president who was

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Speaker 4: responsible for, you know, tons of illicit arcotics being trafficked

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Speaker 4: in the United States. So I think that argument is

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Speaker 4: hard to make when just a few months ago the

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Speaker 4: president went ahead, I pardoned another former head of state

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Speaker 4: who was criminally tried and prosecuted. The former president of

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Speaker 4: Hunters was responsible for assisting aiding in a bedding conspiring

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Speaker 4: to traffic in over I think four hundred tons of

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Speaker 4: illicit narcotics in the United States. He received the forty

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Speaker 4: five year sence, which certainly highlights the severity of his

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Speaker 4: criminal conduct. His conviction was affirmed on a peel. He

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Speaker 4: received due process. There's no claim that the trial, there

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Speaker 4: was anything wrong with the trial, that he did not

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Speaker 4: receive a fair trial. But yet the president pardon him.

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Speaker 4: So what kind of evidence would justify pardoning such an individual.

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Speaker 4: So I think that that undercuts the claim that this

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Speaker 4: was just a legitimate criminal enforcement operation and really raises

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Speaker 4: the issue, Well, then if that wasn't the true reason

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Speaker 4: why the United States went into Venezuela, then what's the

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Speaker 4: true reason? And then that raise of the question of oil.

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Speaker 4: Was it just all about oil?

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Speaker 3: At the end of the day, is.

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Speaker 4: The law enforcement argument simply of FACAD a disguise for

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Speaker 4: the real reason, which is to take control of Venezuela

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Speaker 4: and boil reserves.

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Speaker 1: It sounds like there's a lot of motion practice ahead.

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Speaker 3: There may be.

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Speaker 4: A serious question about whether this case actually goes to trial,

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Speaker 4: and the reason being is that through criminal discovery there

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Speaker 4: could be requests for discovery of evidence that perhaps is

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Speaker 4: classified evidence, and under the Classified Information Procedures Act, the

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Speaker 4: defendant has a right to evidence to support because or

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Speaker 4: her defense, even if that evidence is classified. So that

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Speaker 4: could be a really interesting question about balancing national security

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Speaker 4: interests with respect to classified information and the defendant's interest

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Speaker 4: in receiving a fair trial. If at the end of

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Speaker 4: the day, the core concludes that the defendant's interest in

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Speaker 4: receiving a fair trial, which is a constitutional right, supersedes

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Speaker 4: the classified national security interests concerns, then the prosecution the

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Speaker 4: problem is justice going to have to make a hard

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Speaker 4: decision do we want to disclose that classified information? Is

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Speaker 4: that going to be so harmful to national security that

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Speaker 4: we would prefer to not go forward with the prosecution

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Speaker 4: or offer try to resolve the case pursuant to a

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Speaker 4: guilty plea based upon reduced charges, maybe a reduced sentence.

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Speaker 4: So I think there's a serious issue kind of lurking

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Speaker 4: out there in that regard.

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Speaker 3: And then at the same.

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Speaker 4: Time, I wonder whether any of the evidence to be

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Speaker 4: used against Mother Goodo at trial was obtained pursuant to

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Speaker 4: a electronic surveillance warrant under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

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Speaker 4: And if that's the case, then there could be sensive

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Speaker 4: litigation on whether that evidence should be disclosed and whether

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Speaker 4: that evidence was lawfully obtained pursuant to a lawful fis

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Speaker 4: a wart and that could be another reason for the

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Speaker 4: government willing to enter into a lesser guilty plea.

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Speaker 1: Coming up next, what kind of evidence might be presented

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Speaker 1: at trial? This is bloomberg. The US government's most consequential

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Speaker 1: prosecution of a foreign head of state in decades kicked

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Speaker 1: off Manhattan courtroom today. Ousted Venezuelan leader Nicholas Maduro and

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Speaker 1: his wife pleaded not guilty to the charges against them.

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Speaker 1: Maduro is facing charges of narco terrorism, conspiracy, cocaine importation, conspiracy,

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Speaker 1: and possession of machine guns and destructive devices. Last month,

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Speaker 1: President Trump pardoned another leader, former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez,

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Speaker 1: who'd been tried and convicted of similar charges and was

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Speaker 1: serving a forty five year prison sentence. Here's Trump's explanation

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Speaker 1: of that pardon.

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Speaker 2: The man that I pardoned was, if you could equate

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Speaker 2: it to us, he was treated like the Biden administration

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Speaker 2: treated a man named Trump that didn't work out too

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Speaker 2: well for them. This was a man who was persecuted

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Speaker 2: very unfairly. He was the head of the country. He

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Speaker 2: was persecuted very unfairly, and there are a number of them,

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Speaker 2: and we felt that it was a very unfair situation

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Speaker 2: that happened to him.

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Speaker 1: I've been talking to a former federal prosecutor, Jimmy Garule,

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Speaker 1: a professor at Notre Dame Law School. Jimmy tell us

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Speaker 1: a little about the charges against Maduro and the similarity

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Speaker 1: to the charges the Justice Department leveled against him during

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Speaker 1: the first Trump administration in twenty twenty.

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Speaker 4: They're very similar, and so again it's primarily kind of

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Speaker 4: enabling drug trafficking, enabling drugs to be trafficked from Venezuela

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Speaker 4: to the United States. So drug trafficking charges and then

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Speaker 4: weapons trafficking related charges and basically the Madudo was part

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Speaker 4: of a conspiracy with drug organization drug cartels to a

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Speaker 4: traffic illicit drugs into the United States.

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Speaker 1: It appears that some of the government's evidence against the

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Speaker 1: Maduros includes recordings of DEA agents and relatives of Maduro,

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Speaker 1: and also there may be cooperating witnesses because, for example,

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Speaker 1: Venezuela's former military intelligence chief pleaded guilty to narco terrorism

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Speaker 1: and drug trafficking charges in the case in June of

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty five, and of Venezuela in general also pleaded guilty.

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Speaker 1: Does it seem as if the government does have some

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Speaker 1: strong evidence.

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Speaker 4: Assuming that they do, this would not be the kind

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Speaker 4: of case because it's such a high profile case the

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Speaker 4: governments is want to ensure that it obtains the conviction

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Speaker 4: against Maduro. I mean, the last thing the government would

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Speaker 4: want would be for the jury to return a verdict

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Speaker 4: of not guilty, you know, quitting the president Maduro. And

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Speaker 4: so I suspect that there are members of the drug cartel,

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Speaker 4: members of the drug conspiracy that are going to testify

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Speaker 4: against Maduro. The question then is is that what promises

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Speaker 4: were made to them in exchange for their cooperation, and

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Speaker 4: under a very important Supreme Court decision called Brady versus Maryland,

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Speaker 4: the US government has an obligation, a constitutional obligation, to

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Speaker 4: disclose exculpatory material evidence, including impeachment evidence, of critical government witnesses.

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Speaker 4: And so the government's going to have to disclose whatever

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Speaker 4: deals they cut with these witnesses to testify at trial,

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Speaker 4: and once that evidence is received by the defense, that's

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Speaker 4: going to be used to impeach those witnesses at trial,

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Speaker 4: and it could really undermine the credibility of their testimony.

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Speaker 3: So that's another big issue.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I was wondering how difficult it would be to

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Speaker 1: tie all this to Maduro. I mean, do they need

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Speaker 1: direct orders from him? What kind of proof would they need.

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Speaker 4: That's always a difficult challenge in drug conspiracy cases. It's

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Speaker 4: easy to ensnare and prosecute and convict the lower level members,

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Speaker 4: even mid level members of the drug conspiracy. It's much

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Speaker 4: more difficult to prosecute the individuals that are at the

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Speaker 4: top of the conspiracy. And the reason being is because

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Speaker 4: they are so insulated. They're so insulated from specific drug transactions.

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Speaker 4: They have people that are acting on behalf of the

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Speaker 4: drug kingpins, and so it's very difficult to uncover direct evidence,

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Speaker 4: direct evidence of the drug kingpins participation in the conspiracy.

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Speaker 4: And so that's going to be another challenge that the

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Speaker 4: Department of Justice is going to face in this prosecution.

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Speaker 1: In a case like this, I mean, for a district

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Speaker 1: court judge to say there's no jurisdiction here, let him go. Realistically,

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Speaker 1: would it take a lot more than a normal, low

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Speaker 1: profile case.

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Speaker 4: I don't think any any federal district court judge is

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Speaker 4: going to want to be criticized for doing that. You know,

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Speaker 4: you dismissed the criminal charges against a former head of

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Speaker 4: state who was charged with, you know, trafficking in large

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Speaker 4: quantities of illicit rocotics.

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Speaker 3: And then on top of.

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Speaker 4: That, of course, there is a kind of a presumption

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Speaker 4: here in favor. You know, so the courts traditionally grant

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Speaker 4: substantial difference to the president, to the executive in the

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Speaker 4: field of national security and foreign affairs, substantial difference. So

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Speaker 4: that's the starting point, you know, that's the legal standard,

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Speaker 4: that's the floor. We're going to give you great substantial

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Speaker 4: difference with respect to the action taken. So it would

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Speaker 4: have to be something very significant, very outrageous to kind

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Speaker 4: of overcome that that legal standard of substantial difference and

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Speaker 4: cause the court to intervene and dismiss the charges.

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Speaker 1: Do you think it could be as long as a

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Speaker 1: year before this if there is a trial before this

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Speaker 1: gets to trial, with all the preliminary mode and discovery.

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Speaker 3: I think it's very realistic.

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Speaker 4: I think it's very reasonable to assume that when we

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Speaker 4: start looking at this long list of potential pre trial

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Speaker 4: motions that are going to be filed in this case,

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Speaker 4: the complexity of those legal issues, the discovery that's going

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Speaker 4: to be an issue in this case, I would not

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Speaker 4: be surprised if the trial date, the commencement of the

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Speaker 4: trial doesn't begin until sometime in twenty twenty seven.

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Speaker 1: Do you see broader ramifications of this on international law

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Speaker 1: in general?

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Speaker 4: What does this part tend with respect to international law?

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Speaker 4: What is the status of international law after this action

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Speaker 4: taken by the president? I mean, is international law just

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Speaker 4: something that the United States is going to dismiss whenever

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Speaker 4: it chooses to do so, and raises a defense whenever

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Speaker 4: it benefits the government, but otherwise it doesn't. It doesn't

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Speaker 4: constitute any type of a legal deterrence, and it doesn't

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Speaker 4: appear that international law, at least as the President Trump

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Speaker 4: sees it, is any deterrence to any action that the

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Speaker 4: President seeks to take. I'm equally concerned about threats that

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Speaker 4: the president is making to other countries Greenland, Colombia, you know, Mexico,

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Speaker 4: you know, implied threats, which really raised concerns about, again,

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Speaker 4: what precedent this is setting for the future. So the

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Speaker 4: president can do this, there are no consequences, there's no accountability,

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Speaker 4: and then does that embolden him to engage in similar

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Speaker 4: conduct against other countries that he has differences with. It's

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Speaker 4: very unsettling, it's very disruptive to the region.

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Speaker 1: Thanks so much for joining me today, Jimmy. That's professor

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Speaker 1: Jimmy Garul of Notre Dame Law School. The case against

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Speaker 1: ousted Venezuela and leader Nicholas Maduro promises to be an

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Speaker 1: extraordinary legal battle with major geopolitical ramifications. The middle of

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Speaker 1: the night military operation that captured Maduro comes after strikes

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Speaker 1: on Somalia, Nigeria, Syria, Iraq, Iran and in international waters

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Speaker 1: during Trump's second term, and President Trump indicated there's more

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Speaker 1: to come.

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Speaker 2: Because we want to surround ourselves with good neighbors. We

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Speaker 2: want to surround ourselves with stability. We want to surround

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Speaker 2: ourself with energy. We have tremendous energy in that country.

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Speaker 2: It's very important that we protect it. We need that

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Speaker 2: for ourselves, we need that for the world, and we

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Speaker 2: want to make sure we can protect it.

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Speaker 1: Joining me now is an expert in international law, Jessica Peak,

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Speaker 1: director of the International and Comparative Law Program at UCLA

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Speaker 1: Law School. Jessica start by telling us whether you think

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Speaker 1: Maduro's capture violates international law.

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Speaker 5: Yes, and there is nothing under international law that will

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Speaker 5: allows a state to intervene in the territory of another

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Speaker 5: state to arrest anybody, let alone a sitting head of state.

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Speaker 5: And so I think we have a couple of different

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Speaker 5: significant international legal issues at play here with regard to

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Speaker 5: the US going into the territory and then capturing and

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Speaker 5: rendering Madurea. So the first is that this is really

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Speaker 5: a violation of the prohibition of the use of force

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Speaker 5: under Article two four of the UN Charter. This is

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Speaker 5: both a treaty prohibition and a customery international law norm.

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Speaker 5: And basically what we have here is a violation of

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Speaker 5: the unlawful use of force and the territorial integrity of

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Speaker 5: Venezuela by the United States, which can be considered an

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Speaker 5: act of aggression. The only way that such an intervention

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Speaker 5: could be legal, or the only couple of ways, is

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Speaker 5: first if there was a Security Council resolution authorizing the intervention.

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Speaker 5: We don't have that here. And then the second way

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Speaker 5: that the intervention could be legal if the Trump administration

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Speaker 5: was acting in self defense under Article fifty one of

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Speaker 5: the UN Charter. And that's a right that emerges in

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Speaker 5: response to an armed attack, So that would emerge if

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Speaker 5: the US had in some way been subject to an

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Speaker 5: armed attack by Venezuela. We do not have an armed

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Speaker 5: attack here, nor is there really any credible threat or

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Speaker 5: hint that there could have been a future attack by

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Speaker 5: Venezuela against the United States. So of those two potential

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Speaker 5: justifications for intervention, neither of them are valid or present here.

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Speaker 1: So I mean, what the United States has said, and

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Speaker 1: what Marco Rubio has said, is that this was not

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Speaker 1: an invasion, it was not a regime change. It was

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Speaker 1: simply an arrest operation. He said, it was a law

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Speaker 1: enforcement function to capture an indicted drug trafficker. Does that

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Speaker 1: support the United States position in any way.

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Speaker 5: No, I mean, there's nothing under international law that allows

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Speaker 5: for a domestic law enforcement operation to be enacted on

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Speaker 5: the territory of another state, just no legal basis for

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Speaker 5: that at all.

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Speaker 1: Are the US actions here similar to those in the

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Speaker 1: arrest of Noriega, Yes, So.

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Speaker 5: There's been some comparison between Noriega and Maduro's arrest, and

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Speaker 5: I think there is some factual similarities, certainly, but there

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Speaker 5: are also some significant differences. So Noriega's arrest followed the

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Speaker 5: nineteen eighty nine US invasion of Panama and led to

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Speaker 5: his extradition to the United States, and when he arrived

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Speaker 5: in the United States, he was indicted, tried, and convicted

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Speaker 5: for drug trafficking and money laundering, and ultimately served several

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Speaker 5: years in US federal prison. He was then extra dated

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Speaker 5: to France to face other charges, and eventually was returned

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Speaker 5: to Panama to serve his sentence there and face additional

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Speaker 5: charges in Panama. Anyway, in that case, the US alleged

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Speaker 5: that Noriega was an illegitimate leader and recognized the candidate

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Speaker 5: that Noriega claimed he had defeated in the election of

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Speaker 5: May of nineteen eighty nine, and in that invasion, Washington

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Speaker 5: emphasized that it was restoring democracy after Noriega had annulled

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Speaker 5: that election. It's very important to note in that instance

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Speaker 5: that the UN General Assembly condemned the US invasion of

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Speaker 5: Panama as a violation of international law, and in addition,

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Speaker 5: various human rights groups, both in the US but also internationally,

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Speaker 5: condemned that forcible extraction of Noriega by the US taking

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Speaker 5: him from Panama to the United States. The reason that

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Speaker 5: it is a bit factually different here is because the

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Speaker 5: US administration at that time was able to claim that

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Speaker 5: the new government had consented to Noriega's arrest and removal

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Speaker 5: in that manner. And so basically, after Noriega was brought

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Speaker 5: from the Panama to the US, the new government that

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Speaker 5: was installed in Panama was friendly to the US, and

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Speaker 5: so they weighed any objections to the circumstances of Noriega's extraction,

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Speaker 5: and that allowed the US to sort of retroactively say

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Speaker 5: that they had consent for those actions that were actually

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Speaker 5: in violation of international law. And because of that consent,

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Speaker 5: that retroactive consent, it quieted a lot of the criticism

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Speaker 5: that had come from the international community.

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Speaker 1: So here again, the US is claiming that Maduro was

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Speaker 1: an illegitimate president, that he wasn't elected properly. And it

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Speaker 1: seems as if the acting president who's been installed is cooperating,

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Speaker 1: shaw we say, with the with the US, complying with

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Speaker 1: the US. So is this likely to be another situation

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Speaker 1: where I mean, who's going to enforce the international law?

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Speaker 4: Right?

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Speaker 5: I mean, that's the big question. So we have Maduro

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Speaker 5: still claiming to be president. He was just in court

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Speaker 5: this morning, and you know, he said he had been kidnapped.

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Speaker 5: He said that he's still a legitimate president. We have

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Speaker 5: the vice president or the deputy president of Venezuela was

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Speaker 5: just sworn in, and because she is maintaining that she's

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Speaker 5: just there in an intraand capacity while Maduro remains president,

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Speaker 5: while he's here in the US, and so, you know,

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Speaker 5: certainly their line of argumentation is Maduro is a head

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Speaker 5: of state and he is entitled to head of state

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Speaker 5: immunity and therefore should not be prosecuted in the states

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Speaker 5: of the US. The US argument seems to be that

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Speaker 5: Maduro is a common criminal and doesn't deserve head of

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Speaker 5: state immunity. There's a few challenges to that. You know

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Speaker 5: Maduro has been recognized as the head of state by

437
00:27:20,440 --> 00:27:22,520
Speaker 5: the US, and the way that the US has interacted

438
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:26,160
Speaker 5: with Maduro over the past year indicates that the US

439
00:27:26,480 --> 00:27:30,760
Speaker 5: was treating him as a head of state capacity, and

440
00:27:30,800 --> 00:27:34,840
Speaker 5: it's obviously quite convenient to now change the reasoning on

441
00:27:34,960 --> 00:27:37,280
Speaker 5: that now that he's in US custody. But I don't

442
00:27:37,320 --> 00:27:41,359
Speaker 5: think there's really many legitimate grounds to say that he

443
00:27:42,040 --> 00:27:44,920
Speaker 5: isn't entitled to that head of state immunity. I think

444
00:27:45,000 --> 00:27:46,600
Speaker 5: we're going to have a little bit of a conflict

445
00:27:46,640 --> 00:27:50,880
Speaker 5: here between international law and US law, because under international law,

446
00:27:51,000 --> 00:27:54,280
Speaker 5: the doctrine of head of state immunity, it shields sitting

447
00:27:54,359 --> 00:27:57,960
Speaker 5: presidents from arrest and prosecution. And this is really designed

448
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:00,800
Speaker 5: to prevent this exact type of action. Is designed to

449
00:28:00,840 --> 00:28:04,879
Speaker 5: prevent third states from intervening in the domestic affairs of

450
00:28:04,880 --> 00:28:08,879
Speaker 5: another state by exercising any kind of jurisdiction overheads of

451
00:28:08,920 --> 00:28:12,119
Speaker 5: state and other senior leaders. This is a customary international

452
00:28:12,160 --> 00:28:17,200
Speaker 5: law obligation. The International Court of Justice has recognized head

453
00:28:17,200 --> 00:28:19,679
Speaker 5: of state immunity in the arrest Lawrance case back in

454
00:28:19,680 --> 00:28:23,240
Speaker 5: two thousand and two. But we have a US domestic

455
00:28:23,280 --> 00:28:27,080
Speaker 5: law doctrine called the Kurf Frisbee doctrine, which allows somebody

456
00:28:27,080 --> 00:28:29,520
Speaker 5: to face trial in the US court room regardless of

457
00:28:29,520 --> 00:28:33,399
Speaker 5: how they arrived here. So if Maduro was forcibly taken

458
00:28:33,440 --> 00:28:36,159
Speaker 5: in violation of international law, which he indeed seems to

459
00:28:36,200 --> 00:28:39,560
Speaker 5: have been taken in violation of international law, US courts

460
00:28:39,640 --> 00:28:43,200
Speaker 5: could still legally prosecute him on the US soil. And so,

461
00:28:43,680 --> 00:28:46,240
Speaker 5: you know, we don't know yet how the judge that

462
00:28:46,280 --> 00:28:48,840
Speaker 5: has been assigned the case will deal with this international

463
00:28:48,960 --> 00:28:52,680
Speaker 5: law doctrine of head of state immunity or whether you know,

464
00:28:53,400 --> 00:28:57,120
Speaker 5: the political preferences of the current Trump administration will be

465
00:28:57,240 --> 00:28:59,800
Speaker 5: weighed more heavily than the international law obligation.

466
00:29:01,280 --> 00:29:05,920
Speaker 1: So we've seen Russia go into Ukraine, We've seen the

467
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:11,080
Speaker 1: war in Gaza. No one seems to be enforcing international law.

468
00:29:11,800 --> 00:29:15,160
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it's a huge problem. And this is

469
00:29:15,320 --> 00:29:18,959
Speaker 5: really another example. And those two that you just mentioned

470
00:29:18,960 --> 00:29:22,240
Speaker 5: of Uko, Russia going into Ukraine, and Israel in Gaza,

471
00:29:22,880 --> 00:29:25,720
Speaker 5: these are all examples of the degradation of the international

472
00:29:25,800 --> 00:29:29,240
Speaker 5: legal system. The international legal system was really founded on

473
00:29:29,320 --> 00:29:32,960
Speaker 5: the principle of non intervention, and we are increasingly seeing

474
00:29:33,520 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 5: powerful states flouting that obligation with very few consequences, and

475
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:41,440
Speaker 5: the reason that there are a few consequences is because

476
00:29:41,480 --> 00:29:46,000
Speaker 5: the way this international law system was set up is flawed,

477
00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:48,840
Speaker 5: and we can see that that is flawed. Now seventy

478
00:29:48,840 --> 00:29:52,080
Speaker 5: five years on, the UN Security Council is meeting to

479
00:29:52,120 --> 00:29:56,040
Speaker 5: discuss this situation. This meeting was requested by Columbia and

480
00:29:56,120 --> 00:29:58,720
Speaker 5: was backed by Russia and China, which is quite interesting

481
00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:02,600
Speaker 5: given the actions of Russia in Ukraine and potential future

482
00:30:02,600 --> 00:30:06,960
Speaker 5: actions of China in Taiwan. And the UN Security Council

483
00:30:07,160 --> 00:30:10,640
Speaker 5: is able to impose sanctions on countries to maintain international

484
00:30:10,680 --> 00:30:13,440
Speaker 5: peace and security, and that would include things like arms

485
00:30:13,480 --> 00:30:17,160
Speaker 5: embargoes or trade and travel restrictions. But and this is

486
00:30:17,200 --> 00:30:20,040
Speaker 5: a huge butt, the US is a permanent member of

487
00:30:20,040 --> 00:30:23,240
Speaker 5: the Security Council and as such has a veto power,

488
00:30:23,440 --> 00:30:25,960
Speaker 5: and so any action that the UN Security Council, or

489
00:30:25,960 --> 00:30:29,760
Speaker 5: any potential action talk of action, will immediately be vetoed

490
00:30:29,800 --> 00:30:32,520
Speaker 5: by the US. This is similar to what we've seen

491
00:30:32,680 --> 00:30:35,440
Speaker 5: in the case of Ukraine, where Russia, who is also

492
00:30:35,480 --> 00:30:37,880
Speaker 5: a permanent member, has been able to veto any action,

493
00:30:38,800 --> 00:30:42,280
Speaker 5: and the US has vetoed action against Israel over what

494
00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:44,720
Speaker 5: has been going on in Gaza. For the past few years.

495
00:30:45,240 --> 00:30:48,600
Speaker 5: A similar thing would happen if China were to do

496
00:30:48,640 --> 00:30:51,240
Speaker 5: a similar kind of action in Taiwan. China would also

497
00:30:51,440 --> 00:30:54,320
Speaker 5: have a veto power in the Security Council, And so

498
00:30:54,440 --> 00:30:58,880
Speaker 5: we're seeing these very powerful veto wielding states acting in

499
00:30:58,960 --> 00:31:03,680
Speaker 5: contravention of international law with really very few ways for

500
00:31:03,760 --> 00:31:07,520
Speaker 5: them to be meaningfully rained in. What we are seeing

501
00:31:07,600 --> 00:31:11,040
Speaker 5: and will continue to see is condemnation from other states,

502
00:31:11,280 --> 00:31:14,640
Speaker 5: you know, criticizing the US for this violation of international law.

503
00:31:15,160 --> 00:31:19,360
Speaker 5: But also there we're seeing that watered down too, because

504
00:31:20,000 --> 00:31:24,360
Speaker 5: many of those condemnations are coming alongside some level of

505
00:31:24,400 --> 00:31:27,600
Speaker 5: praise for the removal of Maduro, who has been an

506
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:32,400
Speaker 5: authoritarian dictator who has treated his people terribly and has

507
00:31:32,480 --> 00:31:36,080
Speaker 5: led to horrific circumstances in Venezuela. And so we're not

508
00:31:36,800 --> 00:31:42,080
Speaker 5: seeing the full throated criticism of this action that I

509
00:31:42,120 --> 00:31:44,800
Speaker 5: would have liked to see, where states were really coming

510
00:31:44,840 --> 00:31:47,520
Speaker 5: out in favor of, you know, the status quo of

511
00:31:47,560 --> 00:31:51,320
Speaker 5: the international legal system being applied. One other thing to

512
00:31:51,400 --> 00:31:54,120
Speaker 5: say is, you know, we do have the United Nations

513
00:31:54,160 --> 00:31:58,000
Speaker 5: General Assembly, and we were talking earlier about the Noriega case,

514
00:31:58,480 --> 00:32:01,520
Speaker 5: and in that case, the UN Generalist Assembly did issue

515
00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:05,360
Speaker 5: a resolution that criticized the US for its violations of

516
00:32:05,360 --> 00:32:09,360
Speaker 5: international law for that invasion of Panamanian territory. So it's

517
00:32:09,440 --> 00:32:12,680
Speaker 5: possible that we might see a similar UN General Assembly

518
00:32:12,800 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 5: vote on a resolution to condemn the US actions here.

519
00:32:17,000 --> 00:32:21,320
Speaker 5: Usually UN General Assembly resolutions require a simple majority to pass,

520
00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:24,720
Speaker 5: but if it is an important question like the maintenance

521
00:32:24,760 --> 00:32:26,960
Speaker 5: of international peace and security and the question that we

522
00:32:27,040 --> 00:32:30,560
Speaker 5: have here, then a two thirds majority is required. So

523
00:32:30,800 --> 00:32:33,800
Speaker 5: if the UN General Assembly were brought together to vote

524
00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:36,480
Speaker 5: on this, it would require two thirds of states to

525
00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:39,800
Speaker 5: vote in favor of a resolution. Whether or not we'll

526
00:32:39,840 --> 00:32:42,560
Speaker 5: get that, who knows. I don't have a crystal ball

527
00:32:42,640 --> 00:32:46,680
Speaker 5: to see. I think though, if there is a UN

528
00:32:46,720 --> 00:32:50,960
Speaker 5: General Assembly vote and even you know, a simple majority

529
00:32:50,960 --> 00:32:55,360
Speaker 5: of states vote to condemn US action, that is quite powerful.

530
00:32:55,400 --> 00:32:59,040
Speaker 5: That is quite a powerful indication that the international community

531
00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:02,920
Speaker 5: is not just going to sit quietly while the US

532
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:07,080
Speaker 5: violates a very fundamental bedrock principle of international law.

533
00:33:07,800 --> 00:33:11,760
Speaker 1: It seems that President Trump and Secretary of State Marco

534
00:33:11,880 --> 00:33:15,920
Speaker 1: Rubio are not concerned about that, because Trump gave a

535
00:33:15,960 --> 00:33:20,840
Speaker 1: warning to the Colombian president, and also there was talk

536
00:33:20,880 --> 00:33:25,240
Speaker 1: about Cuba and on Sunday he said he reiterated that

537
00:33:25,280 --> 00:33:29,480
Speaker 1: the US needs Greenland, so he seems to be broadening

538
00:33:29,600 --> 00:33:32,160
Speaker 1: rather than narrowing his focus.

539
00:33:32,560 --> 00:33:34,920
Speaker 5: He I mean, yes, absolutely, and I has been very

540
00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:37,800
Speaker 5: alarmed to see those kinds of statements being made about

541
00:33:38,160 --> 00:33:42,560
Speaker 5: Cuba and about Greenland. I mean, I think that that

542
00:33:42,720 --> 00:33:46,880
Speaker 5: is a symptom of the lack of condemnation for these

543
00:33:46,920 --> 00:33:51,160
Speaker 5: types of actions. It is really President Trump sort of

544
00:33:51,240 --> 00:33:54,040
Speaker 5: stretching his powers to say, well, I did it here

545
00:33:54,080 --> 00:33:56,080
Speaker 5: in Venezuela, and I'm going to continue doing it. And

546
00:33:56,080 --> 00:33:57,680
Speaker 5: Who's going to stop me? Which I think is a

547
00:33:57,680 --> 00:33:59,800
Speaker 5: super valid question. Who is going to stop him? It's

548
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:03,880
Speaker 5: it's pretty unclear at this point. I think the question

549
00:34:03,920 --> 00:34:06,680
Speaker 5: of Greenland is going to be a very interesting one though,

550
00:34:06,720 --> 00:34:08,920
Speaker 5: because it's right on the doorstep of Europe. The Danish

551
00:34:08,960 --> 00:34:11,920
Speaker 5: Prime Minister has come out extremely strongly against all of

552
00:34:11,960 --> 00:34:14,680
Speaker 5: the saber rattling that has been happening around Greenland for

553
00:34:14,680 --> 00:34:16,680
Speaker 5: the past several months, and over the weekend, you know,

554
00:34:16,760 --> 00:34:19,839
Speaker 5: came out even more vocally against what the Trump administration

555
00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:22,840
Speaker 5: was saying. And you know, the US has no claim

556
00:34:23,239 --> 00:34:26,440
Speaker 5: to Greenland for reasons of US domestic national security, that

557
00:34:26,600 --> 00:34:29,359
Speaker 5: is just not how this works. And I think I've

558
00:34:29,400 --> 00:34:32,680
Speaker 5: seen mention of possible invocation of, you know, Article five

559
00:34:32,719 --> 00:34:36,399
Speaker 5: of the NATO Agreement, which would require all NATO member

560
00:34:36,440 --> 00:34:40,640
Speaker 5: states to resist any military intervention into a NATO member

561
00:34:41,040 --> 00:34:44,640
Speaker 5: That's obviously incredibly complex because the US is a NATO

562
00:34:44,680 --> 00:34:47,480
Speaker 5: member state. Although Trump has for many years been saying

563
00:34:47,480 --> 00:34:50,040
Speaker 5: we should pull back from NATO, and we've already sort

564
00:34:50,040 --> 00:34:52,520
Speaker 5: of rolled back some of our obligations there. So it

565
00:34:52,600 --> 00:34:55,839
Speaker 5: might be that Greenland is the stretch too far for this,

566
00:34:56,400 --> 00:34:59,360
Speaker 5: because I think there's a lot of other geopolitical issues

567
00:34:59,360 --> 00:35:02,760
Speaker 5: that that brings up, and that would impact more strongly

568
00:35:02,920 --> 00:35:07,000
Speaker 5: on some of our European allies if we're still calleda allies.

569
00:35:07,320 --> 00:35:10,239
Speaker 5: I mean, one thing that probably heard from other commentators too,

570
00:35:10,560 --> 00:35:12,919
Speaker 5: is that we can see the hypocrisy of this action

571
00:35:13,080 --> 00:35:14,920
Speaker 5: very clearly if we look at what happened with the

572
00:35:14,920 --> 00:35:19,080
Speaker 5: Honduran president, right he was extradited to the US on

573
00:35:19,280 --> 00:35:22,720
Speaker 5: very similar charges. He was tried and committed and sentenced

574
00:35:22,719 --> 00:35:25,200
Speaker 5: in the US to forty five years in prison. Just

575
00:35:25,440 --> 00:35:28,759
Speaker 5: last month, President Trump pardoned him for those actions. And

576
00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:31,400
Speaker 5: now we're trying to bring another case against another sitting

577
00:35:31,440 --> 00:35:35,200
Speaker 5: head of state for very similar behavior, and so it

578
00:35:35,360 --> 00:35:38,800
Speaker 5: just really shows, I think the hypocritical nature of the

579
00:35:38,840 --> 00:35:41,920
Speaker 5: Trump administration's action with regard to Maduro.

580
00:35:41,640 --> 00:35:44,640
Speaker 1: In this case, there's a long way to go here.

581
00:35:44,800 --> 00:35:47,800
Speaker 1: And thanks so much for joining me tonight. That's Jessica Peak,

582
00:35:47,880 --> 00:35:51,640
Speaker 1: director of the International and Comparative Law Program at UCLA

583
00:35:51,760 --> 00:35:54,600
Speaker 1: Law School. And that's it for this edition of the

584
00:35:54,640 --> 00:35:57,600
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Law Show. Remember you can always get the latest

585
00:35:57,640 --> 00:36:00,759
Speaker 1: legal news on our Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can find

586
00:36:00,800 --> 00:36:05,360
Speaker 1: them on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and at www dot Bloomberg

587
00:36:05,400 --> 00:36:09,200
Speaker 1: dot com, slash podcast Slash Law, and remember to tune

588
00:36:09,239 --> 00:36:12,440
Speaker 1: into The Bloomberg Law Show every weeknight at ten pm

589
00:36:12,520 --> 00:36:16,080
Speaker 1: Wall Street Time. I'm June Grosso, and you're listening to

590
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Speaker 1: Bloomberg