WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump confirmed Wednesday that he authorized the CIA to conduct covert operations inside Venezuela and said he was weighing land operations in the country.

President Donald Trump speaks Wednesday during an event in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington.

The acknowledgement of covert action in Venezuela by the U.S. spy agency came after the U.S. military in recent weeks carried out deadly strikes against alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean. U.S. forces destroyed at least five boats since early September, killing 27 people. Four of those vessels originated from Venezuela.

Asked during a Wednesday event in the Oval Office why he authorized the CIA to take action in Venezuela, Trump affirmed he made the move.

"I authorized for two reasons, really," Trump replied. "No. 1, they have emptied their prisons into the United States of America," he said. "And the other thing, the drugs, we have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela, and a lot of the Venezuelan drugs come in through the sea."

Trump added the administration "is looking at land" as it considers further strikes in the region. He declined to say whether the CIA has authority to take action against President Nicolás Maduro.

Trump made the unusual acknowledgement of a CIA operation shortly after The New York Times published that the CIA was authorized to carry out covert action in Venezuela.

Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez speaks Sept. 23 during a march in support of President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela.

Maduro pushes back

On Wednesday, Maduro lashed out at the record of the U.S. spy agency in various conflicts around the world without directly addressing Trump's comments about authorizing the CIA to carry out covert operations in Venezuela.

"No to regime change that reminds us so much of the (overthrows) in the failed eternal wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and so on," Maduro said at a televised event of the National Council for Sovereignty and Peace, which is made up of representatives from various political, economic, academic and cultural sectors in Venezuela.

"No to the coups carried out by the CIA, which remind us so much of the 30,000 disappeared," a figure estimated by human rights organizations such as the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo during the military dictatorship in Argentina (1976-1983). He also referred to the 1973 coup in Chile.

"How long will the CIA continue to carry on with its coups? Latin America doesn't want them, doesn't need them and repudiates them," Maduro added.

Speaking in English, he said: "Not war, yes peace, not war. Is that how you would say it? Who speaks English? Not war, yes peace, the people of the United States, please. Please, please, please."

In a statement, Venezuela's Foreign Ministry on Wednesday rejected "the bellicose and extravagant statements by the President of the United States, in which he publicly admits to having authorized operations to act against the peace and stability of Venezuela."

"This unprecedented statement constitutes a very serious violation of international law and the United Nations' Charter and obliges the community of countries to denounce these clearly immoderate and inconceivable statements," said the statement, which Foreign Minister Yván Gil posted on his Telegram channel.

Members of the Bolivarian Militia march Sept. 23 in support of President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela.

Resistance from Congress

This month, the Trump administration declared drug cartels to be unlawful combatants and pronounced that the United States is in an "armed conflict" with them, justifying the military action as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the U.S.

The move spurred anger in Congress from members of both major political parties that Trump effectively committed an act of war without seeking congressional authorization.

On Wednesday, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said while she supports cracking down on trafficking, the administration went too far.

"The Trump administration's authorization of covert C.I.A. action, conducting lethal strikes on boats and hinting at land operations in Venezuela slides the United States closer to outright conflict with no transparency, oversight or apparent guardrails," Shaheen said. "The American people deserve to know if the administration is leading the U.S. into another conflict, putting servicemembers at risk or pursuing a regime-change operation."

The Trump administration had yet to provide underlying evidence to lawmakers proving the boats targeted by the U.S. military were in fact carrying narcotics, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

The officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the administration only pointed to unclassified video clips of the strikes posted on social media by Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and had yet to produce "hard evidence" that the vessels were carrying drugs.

Lawmakers expressed frustration that the administration offered few details about how it came to decide the U.S. is in armed conflict with cartels or which criminal organizations it claims are "unlawful combatants."

The U.S. Coast Guard continued its typical practice of stopping boats and seizing drugs.

Trump said Wednesday, "we've been doing that for 30 years, and it has been totally ineffective. They have faster boats." He added, "They're world-class speedboats, but they're not faster than missiles."

Human rights groups raised concerns that the strikes flout international law and are extrajudicial killings.

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