As Chavez was announcing the expulsion, two top US cabinet members were criticizing him in Washington. At a press luncheon, US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said: “You’ve got Chavez in Venezuela with a lot of oil money. He’s a person who was elected legally just as Adolf Hitler was elected legally.” On Capitol Hill, US National Intelligence Director John Negroponte warned against Chavez’s reelection, and said the Venezuelan leader is “seeking closer economic, military and diplomatic ties with Iran and North Korea.”