Trump Slams Venezuela After Attacking Vessel Off its Coast: 'Has Been a Very Bad Actor'

President Donald Trump criticized Venezuela's authoritarian government when addressing the U.S.'s attack against a vessel off the country's coast on Tuesday.

Addressing the press at the Oval Office, Trump was asked why the boat in question and the 11 people on it were killed instead of taken into custody.

On the boat you have massive amounts of drugs. We have tapes of them speaking about it. There are massive amounts of drug coming into our country to kill a lot of people. You see bags of drugs all over the boat. A lot of other people won't be doing it again after seeing that video," Trump said.

"We have to protect our country and we're going to. Venezuela has been a very bad actor. They've been sending millions of people into the country. Many of them are Tren de Aragua, some of the worst people anywhere in the world," he added.

Earlier on Wednesday Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth explicitly warned the country's authoritarian President, Nicolas Maduro, saying he "should be worried" after the development.

"The only one who should be worried is Nicolas Maduro, who is acting as the kingpin of a narco state. Not actually elected and indicted for $50 million by the U.S. We know he's involved in the kind of drug-running that has affected the American people directly," Hegseth said during an interview on Fox News.

Regarding the attack itself, Hegseth said officials "knew exactly who were on that boat and what they were doing." "It's a new dawn. Those 11 drug-traffickers are no longer with us, sending a very clear sign that the U.S. won't tolerate this kind of activity in our hemisphere," he added.

In another passage of the interview, Hegseth said the attack was not a one-off. "We've got assets in the air, assets in the water, assets on ships, because this is a deadly serious mission for us, and it won't it won't stop with just this strike," he said.

A Venezuelan official, however, claimed the video shared by the White House on Tuesday that showed the vessel being destroyed was made with artificial intelligence.

Communication Minister Freddy Ñañez said in a Telegram channel that "it seems" Secretary of State Marco Rubio "keeps lying to his president."

"After getting him between a rock and a hard place, now he gives him an AI video as 'proof,'" Ñañez added. "Marco Rubio, stop trying to encourage a war and trying to stain President Donald Trump's hands. Venezuela doesn't pose a threat."