Former Venezuelan Spy Chief Tells Trump the Cártel de los Soles Exists and Maduro Holds Influence In It

Last month, the United States government designated the Cártel de los Soles, a Venezuelan-based organization allegedly led by President Nicolás Maduro, as a foreign terrorist organization.

For months, the Trump administration has argued that the cartel is run by Maduro and other top officials who, through a criminal network woven into Venezuela's military and political institutions, enable and profit from drug trafficking. And days ago it designated the group as a terrorist organization.

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Apart from Maduro, U.S. security agencies have also identified Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello Rondón and former military intelligence chief Hugo Armando "El Pollo" Carvajal Barrios as key figures in the organization.

Although Maduro has repeatedly denied any link to the Cártel de los Soles, Carvajal, a former three-star Venezuelan general who once held a powerful role in the country's socialist government, recently released a letter confirming the group's existence and the involvement of Venezuela's top leadership.

First reported by the Dallas Express, the letter is addressed to President Donald Trump, with Carvajal saying he wrote it to warn the United States about the dangers posed by the criminal organization.

In the letter, Carvajal says he personally witnessed how Hugo Chávez's government evolved into a criminal enterprise that the Maduro regime then carried forward.

"The purpose of this organization, now known as the Cartel of the Suns, is to weaponize drugs against the United States. The drugs that reached your cities through new routes were not accidents of corruption nor just the work of independent traffickers; they were deliberate policies coordinated by the Venezuelan regime against the United States," Carvajal wrote.

According to the former general, the plan was first proposed by the Cuban government to Chávez in the early 2000s, and the Venezuelan regime carried it out with help from the FARC, a Colombian guerrilla group; the ELN, a leftist guerrilla group; Cuban operatives; and Hezbollah, a Lebanese militant group. He added that the Maduro government provided weapons, passports, and protection to those groups so they could operate freely inside Venezuela.

El Pollo also said he witnessed decisions by Chávez and Maduro to strengthen and "weaponize" criminal gangs such as Tren de Aragua to shield the regime. Carvajal said Chávez ordered criminal leaders inside and outside prisons to be recruited in exchange for impunity.

After Chávez died, Carvajal said Maduro expanded those effort by sending gang members abroad to artificially lower Venezuela's crime statistics.

"Gang leaders were instructed to send thousands of members out of the country. This was coordinated through the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Prisons, the National Guard, and national police forces. Tren de Aragua became the most effective and fastest growing," the letter reads.

Carvajal also said Tren de Aragua exploited what he called the Biden administration's relaxed immigration policies to enter the United States.

"They now have obedient, armed personnel on American soil. To finance their operations, they were explicitly instructed to continue kidnapping, extorting, and killing. Every crime they commit on your soil is an act ordered by the regime," Carvajal added.

Carvajal released the letter via his attorney, as he awaits sentencing in the United States after his conviction on drug-trafficking charges. In June, he pleaded guilty in a U.S. court to conspiracy to import cocaine and participating in narco-terrorism in coordination with the FARC, which reinforced allegations made by Trump officials of ties between the Venezuelan government and transnational criminal organizations.

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