UNITED STATES PERSPECTIVE

Washington turned the death of a gang boss into a display of presidential force. On Friday night, as the national team opened its World Cup against Paraguay, Donald Trump posted on Truth Social the aerial video of a green-roofed warehouse blown apart: 'At my direction, Southern Command delivered a swift and lethal kinetic strike to successfully execute Niño Guerrero.' Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth specified on X that the strike hit 'a Tren de Aragua compound in Venezuela' earlier in the week. American coverage swings between triumphalism and flagging the holes in the story: the president 'did not specify exactly where or when' the attack took place, NPR and NBC note. The framing is explicitly domestic. Trump links the strike to his anti-immigration campaign, naming 'precious 12-year-old Jocelyn Nungaray' and '22-year-old Laken Riley,' two victims turned MAGA symbols, and accusing Joe Biden of having 'opened our Southern Border to millions of illegal criminals.' Guerrero Flores, 43, had been indicted in New York since December for racketeering and supporting terrorism, with a $5 million bounty on his head. What the American press buries at the bottom of the article is the most explosive admission: the 'close' coordination with Caracas. Hegseth speaks of a 'shared' US-Venezuelan commitment against 'narco-terrorists,' a phrase that would have been unthinkable a year ago when Washington still branded the Caracas regime a narco-dictatorship.