The US is among many nations that do not recognise Maduro as Venezuela’s legitimate leader, after the last election in 2024 was widely dismissed as neither free nor fair. Opposition tallies from polling stations showed its candidate had won by a landslide.
Venezuela plays a relatively minor role in the region’s drug trade.
The Pentagon said on Friday that the USS Gerald R Ford carrier would deploy to the US Southern Command area of responsibility, which includes Central America and South America, as well as the Caribbean.
The additional forces “will enhance and augment existing capabilities to disrupt narcotics trafficking and degrade and dismantle transnational criminal organisations”, spokesman Sean Parnell said.
Maduro accused the US of seeking “a new eternal war” in his address.
“They promised they would never again get involved in a war, and they are fabricating a war,” he told state media.
The carrier’s deployment would provide the resources to start conducting strikes against targets on the ground.
Trump has repeatedly raised the possibility of what he called “land action” in Venezuela, saying earlier this week that the US is “looking at land now” after getting “the sea very well under control”.
“We stopped all drugs from coming in by sea. I will stop all drugs from coming in by land very shortly. You’ll see that starting,” he told reporters at the White House on Saturday before departing for a trip to Asia.
The US has also bolstered its air presence in the region. BBC Verify has identified a number of US military aircraft across Puerto Rico.
It comes as CNN reports Trump is considering targeting cocaine facilities, external and drug trafficking routes inside Venezuela, but is yet to make a final decision.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio played down the deployment to reporters on his plane flying to Qatar on Saturday, saying: “We have deployed U.S. assets and interests all over the planet, but when we do it in our own hemisphere…everyone sort of freaks out.”
But he reiterated the Trump administration’s view that Venezuela poses a serious threat to the US through the illegal drug trade.
“Unfortunately, the regime that governs, but is not the government of Venezuela, is a transshipment organization,” he said. “They allow cocaine from Colombia and other places to be shipped through national territory – not just with the cooperation, but in many cases, with the participation of elements of this regime.”
Military analysts have pointed out that intercepting drugs at sea does not require a force as big as the current US one.
