Donald Trump attested in an interview on Wednesday that “my own morality” is the only thing that polices his power on the global stage — less than a week after his controversial military action in Venezuela and as he’s publicly eyed Greenland to become a U.S. territory.
“I don’t need international law,” Trump told The New York Times in an expansive, two-hour interview. “I’m not looking to hurt people.”
The president made it clear that previously established legal constraints would not stop his pursuit of dominance in the Western Hemisphere, but added when pressed that he understood his administration needed to follow international laws. He caveated, however, that he may interpret those laws differently than they traditionally have been. “It depends what your definition of international law is,” he said.
When all is said and done, the president admitted the only thing able to stop Trump was Trump himself.
“My own morality,” he explained. “My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
The Times’ interview came less than a week after the U.S. enacted a military strike against Venezuela to the capture and arrest the country’s leader, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife for drug crimes. The president later said that while an interim leader was being installed, the United States would control the country.
“It’s going to be run very judiciously, very fairly. And it’s gonna make a lot of money,” he said following the strike. “You know they stole our oil. We built that whole industry and they just took it over like we were nothing. So we did something about it. We’re late, but we did something about it.”
The strike rankled more than a few lawmakers in the hours following the news. Many questioned Trump’s authority to make a move like this on a sovereign nation, with Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern writing on X that “without authorization from Congress, and with the vast majority of Americans opposed to military action, Trump just launched an unjustified, illegal strike on Venezuela.”
Maduro’s arrest also raised alarm in neighboring countries and from allies in the United Nations. The U.N.’s top official, Secretary General António Guterres said that Trump’s orders in Venezuela violated the U.N. charter in an emergency Monday meeting.
“I am deeply concerned about the possible intensification of instability in the country, the potential impact on the region and the precedent it may set for how relations between and among states are conducted,” he said.
