Today is a great day in America. Nicolas Maduro, an indicted drug trafficker and illegitimate communist dictator who has the blood of hundreds of Arkansans and thousands of Americans on his hands, is behind bars in a prison in New York.

Again, he was an illegitimate communist dictator in league with all of America’s enemies around the world. With the Venezuelan people crushed underneath his iron fist for years, Maduro turned the country into a crossroads and playground for the likes of Communist China, Cuba, Iran, Russia, and even Islamic terrorists, like Hezbollah.

I want to take this opportunity to commend the exceptional skill and bravery of our troops, CIA officers, and FBI agents for executing such an amazing military and intelligence operation that brought Maduro’s reign to an abrupt end. It is impossible to overstate the complexity of this mission. But for our troops and our intelligence officers —whose skill, professionalism, and bravery is unmatched in the world—“impossible” isn’t in their vocabulary.

I also commend President Trump for having the courage to take bold, decisive, and audacious action against Nicolas Maduro. This action was well within the President’s constitutional authority. The operation was in keeping with President Bush’s operation to arrest the drug lord and Panamanian President Manuel Noriega in 1989. If anything, Maduro was much worse than Noriega, and Venezuela now is even more vital strategically than Panama was then.

Additionally, this operation did not violate the War Powers Resolution, even if you believe the War Powers Resolution is constitutional. These troops were in and out of Venezuela in a couple of hours.

Only the United States could execute such a dangerous and difficult mission without the loss of a single American life. But instead of celebrating Maduro’s ouster and America’s success, our Democratic colleagues are determined to condemn the operation, all because President Trump ordered it.

Consider that in 2020, Senator Schumer criticized President Trump for “bragg[ing] about his Venezuela policy” but failing to bring “an end to the Maduro regime.” Sounds like a call for regime change to me. Just like Joe Biden’s decision to increase the bounty on Maduro’s head seems like a call for Maduro to be apprehended and brought to justice. Yet, when President Trump did exactly that last weekend, Senator Schumer said, “This is reckless.”

Also, consider Senator Murphy, who said in 2019, “Getting rid of Maduro is good for the United States.” I agree. Unfortunately, he has changed his tune lately. The day after Maduro’s capture, Senator Murphy said, “The invasion of Venezuela has nothing to do with American security.” Nothing! He further said, “Venezuela is not a security threat to the United States.”

I disagree. I think it has more than a little to do with our national security and our safety. I’ve heard from too many Arkansas mothers and fathers whose children have died because of a drug overdose. This operation was about protecting those families and families like them, and anyone who struggles with or who has lost a loved one to addiction.

Again, Nicolas Maduro was an indicted drug trafficker and narco-terrorist. He was in league with the very drug traffickers who are in the business of killing our kids for profit. He didn’t just tolerate drug traffickers in Venezuela or lose control of his territory and allow them to run wild. He was a drug trafficker.

I didn’t conclude that alone. That’s not President Trump’s sole decision, or even President Biden’s decision. That was the finding of a grand jury made up of normal Americans on more than one occasion.

As for the future of Venezuela? Well, of course, it’s ultimately up to the Venezuelans. The interim authorities in charge in Venezuela today know what we expect of them: stop the drug trafficking and the weapons trafficking; accept the return of their refugees and migrants; release political prisoners; expel the Iranians, the Cubans, the Islamic terrorists, like Hezbollah operatives, who have turned Venezuela into a launching pad for regional instability and threats to America’s interests.

It will be a difficult road. Our best source of leverage, though, over the interim authorities is the quarantine that we’ve imposed on their black-market oil, which the Maduro regime used to enrich itself. Not just the regime, but the senior leaders of the regime as well, if you know anything about their spending habits or their tastes.

Yet this resolution, this very resolution we’re debating, might very well require the removal of our Navy ships from the Caribbean that are enforcing the quarantine. Is that what our Democratic friends really want? To let these Chavistas in control of the interim authorities start exporting black-market oil again? To keep themselves in power, unaccountable not only to their own people but to America’s vital national security interests?

I’ll say, I don’t think so. I don’t think our Democratic colleagues want to let Venezuela start exporting black-market oil again. I believe they were genuine years ago when they called for Maduro’s ouster. I believe they are genuine now when they condemn Maduro as an illegitimate dictator and a drug trafficker, someone who repressed his own people. Even if they then immediately want to eat their cake and have it too by saying, “But President Trump still shouldn’t have removed him.” I think it’s just that they’re so blinded by their hatred of President Trump that they feel they have to condemn this action in some way.

Instead, why don’t we just, as I said at the beginning, celebrate the removal of a virulently anti-American, illegitimate, communist dictator, who was trafficking drugs into our country? And then help the Venezuelan people build a bright future that restores the glories of their past, turning a nation that was the most dangerous, anti-American country in our backyard into the most stable and prosperous, pro-American country in our backyard?

So, I urge a no vote against this resolution.