Welcome back to the show.
It's unusual to hear Donald Trump speak kindly of anyone
south of our southern border.
But in last night's State of the Union,
he had some nice words for one Venezuelan politician.
DONALD TRUMP: Two weeks ago, the United States officially
recognized the legitimate government of Venezuela,
and its new president, Juan Guaido.
We stand with the Venezuelan people in their noble quest
for freedom.
And we condemn the brutality of the Maduro regime.
Who is Juan Guaido?
No one's quite sure yet.
What's happening in Venezuela is complicated and confusing,
even for the people involved.
REPORTER: This weekend, massive crowds supporting this man,
opposition leader Juan Guaido, who's declared himself
Venezuela's legitimate president,
accusing Nicolas Maduro of claiming
victory in a sham election.
Who is the president here in Venezuela?
President of Venezuela is Juan Guaido.
And that you?
It's me.
Aw.
I mean, I feel like we have to trust him.
Dictators don't start out that cute, do they?
Guaido is a complete unknown.
But the people of Venezuela absolutely
deserve better than Maduro.
Not only did he steal an election,
he's also been accused of crimes against humanity
and has ties to money laundering and drug trafficking,
and thanks in large part to his rule, Venezuelans are starving.
REPORTER: The country has been plagued by deepening
economic crisis, corruption, crime, all of which
have contributed to a worsening food shortage.
REPORTER: This is what's happening in Venezuela.
We're starving.
We're struggling thanks to this government.
It's the Maduro diet.
To add insult to injury, now it's being appropriated
by Instagram influencers.
I can eat anything I want as long
as I sneak it past the soldiers guarding
the empty grocery store.
Hashtag #Madurodiet, hashtag #positivity.
Things in Venezuela are messed up.
But that doesn't mean that the US can unmess them.
And it definitely doesn't mean we should prep an invasion.
National security advisor, John Bolton,
was spotted with a notepad that said 5,000 troops
to Colombia, which is crazy!
Georgia Governor Brian Kemp also stole an election.
But do you see anyone calling for us to invade Georgia?
Again?
That's right, Georgia.
You guys lost the Civil War.
Never, ever forget that.
[CHEERING]
And Bolton, who again, is the national security advisor,
is openly licking his chops at the thought of getting
our hands on Venezuela's oil.
We're looking at the oil assets.
It'll make a big difference to the United States
economically if we could have American oil
companies really invest in and produce the oil
capabilities in Venezuela.
OK, so let's see obsessing about the oil
capabilities of a country run by a cruel dictator
with a mustache.
Why does this feel familiar to me?
Oh that's right it reminds me of Iraq.
Please don't do another Iraq.
The only thing we should consider rebooting from 2003
is Agent Cody Banks.
But perhaps the worst sign for the US's
involvement in Venezuela is who we are putting in charge.
Diplomat and inventor of handlebar
eyebrows, Elliott Abrams.
If I were Venezuelan, I would not
feel reassured by this man's presence at the helm.
As a Reagan staffer, he was involved
in nearly every awful thing we did
to Latin America in the '80s, except for Flock
of Seagulls hair.
Abrams was appointed by Reagan as the Assistant Secretary
of State for Human Rights.
During that time, he covered up a state backed massacre
in El Salvador, collaborated with a Panamanian dictator who
beheaded a dissenter, insured a Guatemalan dictator could carry
out acts of genocide, and was a fervent supporter
of Nicaraguan rebels who carried out dozens of massacres
across the country.
This was all as a Human Rights advisor.
More like human wrongs advisor.
I'm sorry. What's that?
I'm canceled.
I understand.
Bye everyone.
Nice to know you.
No.
Abrams is so awful.
It's no wonder his eyebrows are trying to escape his face.
Basically, everything Abrams did in Latin America could
be considered a war crime.
But he was only forced to justify one.
His role in the Iran Contra deal, which
was a totally bitchin' '80s scandal, where the US secretly
sold weapons to then embargoed Iran, which then funded
the Contras, who were a right wing
terrorist groups in Nicaragua.
He eventually plead guilty to lying to Congress about it.
But he didn't seem to feel very guilty.
Abrams pleaded guilty today--
criminal charges.
He lied to Congress.
REPORTER: He was one of the so-called true believers
inside the Reagan administration,
a State Department official who believed in supporting
the Nicaraguan Contras, and who loudly opposed Congress when
it outlawed Contra funding.
Bad blood with Congress finally caught up with him.
Information withheld related to activities of the United
States government regarding Central
America, which at that time, I believed
to be proper and lawful.
At the time, I believed it to be proper and lawful is
an excuse for selling your own homemade t-shirts at a Maroon 5
concert, not funding an extremist group
so they can do more murders.
Abrams was pardoned by Bush Sr, who,
I guess after having Jeb for a son,
was simply prone to forgiveness.
Abrams also found it chillingly easy to forgive himself.
After there was a supposed cut off of military aid
to Guatemala, the State Department
authorized at least 114 separate sales of pistols and rifles
to Guatemala.
Whatever [INAUDIBLE] wants to do, Charlie.
I'm not here to refight the Cold War.
I'm glad we won.
Maybe he's not.
We're talking about more than 100,000 murders,
an entire army, many of its top officers,
employees of the US government.
I think we have to start talking about putting Guatemala
and US officials on trial.
I think someone like Mr. Abrams would be a fit--
a subject for such a Nuremberg style inquiry.
But I agree with Mr. Abrams that Democrats would have
to be in the dock with him.
[LAUGHS] He laughs like he just caught all the Smurfs,
which would be funny, except when he's laughing about is
that he was the consulting producer of a bunch
of massacres and he has never, never,
ever, ever, ever going to face any consequences for it.
Hee hee hee.
Having Elliot Abrams oversee our Venezuela policy
is a bit like having Brian Singer direct a film
about the Catholic church.
Abrams has two passions in life.
Ruining countries and scoffing at allowing in refugees
from those countries.
PETER JENNINGS: You have argued in the past
that Salvadorans are coming for economic reasons, not
political reasons.
How on earth do they prove to you that they are in danger?
They need to give us their story.
And they need to give something more
than a general statement that they don't
like things in El Salvador.
They need to give us some facts.
PETER JENNINGS: But isn't everybody
in El Salvador to some extent in danger these days?
There's a war going on.
No.
There's a distinction between an individual who
can prove that he or she is a target of persecution
and just somebody who'd rather live here than in El Salvador.
Our immigration laws do not say that if you
prefer to live here than where you came from,
well fine, move here.
Who's to say if those Salvadorans are fleeing
the region I destabilized or if they just
love New England in the fall.
Tra-la-la.
In 2001, Abrams joined George W. Bush's administration,
after taking the '90's off to play Uncle Leo on "Seinfeld."
[LAUGHTER]
You would think that a person with aiding and covering up
genocide listed on the special skills section of his resume
would be politically radioactive.
But Abrams is still a respected member of the DC community.
Elliott Abrams is somebody who in the Reagan administration,
as I recall, had the portfolio of spreading
democracy around the world.
Elliott Abrams, who is an experienced foreign policy
expert.
They brought in Elliott Abrams.
This is good.
That they're bringing sort of the moderate Republican Bush
foreign policy advisors in.
I think that's good.
It is not good!
How is it so easy for guys like this?
I mean, forget his awful record.
My career would be over if I had this man's eyebrows.
Look.
We will never make up for the things our country did in Latin
America during the Cold War.
But the least we can do is not send
the same gang of rapacious neocons back there again.
Just send Elliott Abrams somewhere else.
Here the Hague is nice this time of year.
We'll be right back.