- Tue Jan 06, 2026 1:27 pm
#103074
Kemi speaks:
Kemi Badenoch says Trump’s Venezuela raid was ‘morally’ right, as she suggests faith in rules-based global order overrated
In a long interview with the Today programme , she declared that what Trump did was “morally … the right thing to do”. She also implied that faith in the rules-based international order, sustained by international law, was overrated because the world did not operate like that any more.
When it was put to her that Margaret Thatcher condemned the US invasion of Grenada in 1983, Badenoch said that Thatcher was right at the time, but that Trump’s action was different. She went on:
Venezuela was a brutal regime. We didn’t even recognise it as a legitimate government. I think that what’s happened is quite extraordinary. But I understand why America has done it.
And the reason why I say this is because, where the legal certainty is not yet clear, morally I do think it was the right thing to do.
Badenoch said she was saying this because she was different from other party leaders and MPs.
I grew up under a military dictatorship [in Nigeria], so I know what it’s like to have someone like Maduro in charge. I know what it’s like to have people celebrating in the street. So I’m not condemning the US.
Asked again if sending special forces in to seize Maduro was the right thing to do, Badenoch replied: “Morally, yes.”
Well, I don't know, but I've been told
You never slow down, you never grow old
I'm tired of screwin' up, tired of going down
Tired of myself, tired of this town