FIFA Peace Prize winner Donald Trump ordered a massive military assault on Venezuela early Saturday morning, sources who understand what peace means confirmed.
Trump received the inaugural "FIFA Peace Prize – Football Unites the World" from FIFA President Gianni Infantino during the Final Draw for the FIFA World Cup 2026 in December, with Infantino praising the president's tireless work to bring people together. The assault on Caracas, which came exactly one month after Trump accepted the peace award, featured bombings of Venezuela's main military complex, presidential palace, and multiple airports, leaving large parts of the capital without electricity.
"This is what we want from a leader who cares about people," the president said, echoing Infantino's remarks from the award ceremony as he announced the U.S. would "run" Venezuela following the capture of President Nicolás Maduro. "We want to live in a safe world, in a safe environment."
The FIFA Peace Prize, sculpted by Azerbaijani artists and due to be bestowed annually to an individual in recognition of their extraordinary action for peace, appears to have inspired Trump to pursue even bolder peace initiatives. Trump said U.S. oil companies would make major investments in Venezuela's oil infrastructure, explaining that nothing brings people together quite like American corporations fixing another country's natural resources.
Human rights groups had expressed concerns that Infantino was cozying up to the president at the expense of political neutrality, though Saturday's events suggest these critics simply failed to understand FIFA's expansive definition of peace, which apparently includes regime change operations conducted without congressional authorization.
The timing proved particularly fortuitous, as Trump had been smarting from not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize he so lusted after. Critics who called the FIFA award "laughably absurd" now face the uncomfortable reality that the president has demonstrated his peace credentials by launching strikes that killed at least 100 people in recent months on vessels in the Caribbean.
Craig Mokhiber, a former United Nations official, had called the FIFA award to Trump "truly shameful", apparently not recognizing that military invasions represent the highest form of bringing people together—specifically, bringing American military personnel together with foreign territories rich in natural resources.
