President Donald Trump took a brief detour from discussing the ongoing war with Iran to tease his potential next job: president of Venezuela.
“After I’m finished with this, I can go to Venezuela. I will quickly learn Spanish. It won’t take too long, I’m good at language,” Trump quipped during a Monday press conference.
Trump, who is a loud and proud monolinguist, then remarked that he was polling higher than anyone has ever polled in Venezuela.
The Daily Beast reached out to the White House for further explanation on which data he was referring to and whether his message was serious.
The Venezuelan firm Meganalisis conducted a survey following the U.S. military’s Jan. 3 ouster of the country’s president, Nicolás Maduro. The results showed that more than 90 percent of Venezuelans in the country said they were grateful to Trump for removing the longtime dictator.
However, a more recent poll from AtlasIntel and Bloomberg found that only about 52 percent of Venezuelans believe civil liberties have improved since the operation, which the Trump administration dubbed “Operation Absolute Resolve.”
Trump has made it no secret that he wishes to pull the South American nation closer into his orbit. During the World Baseball Classic, the president floated the idea of Venezuela becoming the 51st state, saying, “Good things are happening to Venezuela lately! I wonder what this magic is all about? STATEHOOD, #51, ANYONE?”
The Venezuelan team went on to win the tournament, beating the United States in the final game.
Trump has been equally direct about his desire for the country’s natural resources. New reporting from The Atlantic points out that the president referred to oil 19 times in his initial press conference after Maduro’s capture.
The administration also has its eyes on precious metals. Last month, Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said that the U.S. recently brought back $100 million of gold from Venezuela.
Despite Trump’s seemingly grand plans for Venezuela, he has offered his support to the ruling communist regime on the ground.
During Monday’s press conference, he said he was “very happy” with the president-elect of the country: Maduro’s former vice president, Delcy Rodríguez.
Rodríguez, 56, has been in power since early this year, with no clear sign that elections will be held in the country. Though she initially was only appointed to serve 90 days, she has stayed in power past that court-ordered deadline.
The U.S. appears comfortable with the arrangement.
Last week, the U.S. Department of the Treasury lifted sanctions in place on Rodríguez.
Meanwhile, Maduro and his wife, who was also swept up in the January raid, appeared in a New York federal courtroom on March 26 as they face drug trafficking and narco-terrorism charges. No date has been set for their next court appearance. They are both currently being held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn.
