The news website Axios is reporting President Trump may be ready to hold talks with Venezuela’s leader Nicolás Maduro as the U.S. ramps up military threats. The reports came on the same day the Trump administration designated Maduro as the head of a foreign terrorist organization, fueling fear of a potential U.S. invasion of Venezuela, which holds the world’s largest known reserves of oil. While the Trump administration claims its escalating attacks on boats in the Caribbean are in response to drug trafficking, critics say this is just another attempt by the U.S. government to destabilize Venezuela to force a regime change and exploit resources, including oil. Florida Congressmember María Salazar, Republican assistant whip, made these remarks during an interview Monday with Fox Business.

Rep. Maria Salazar: “Venezuela, for the American oil companies, will be a field day, because it will be more than a trillion dollars in economic activity.”

We’ll have more on Venezuela later in the broadcast.

In Sudan, the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group has announced a unilateral three-month ceasefire in its fight against Sudan’s military rulers. The announcement came after the head of the Sudanese Armed Forces rejected a ceasefire proposal advanced by the so-called Quad — Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and the United States. General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan cited the UAE’s role in arming the Rapid Support Forces, who he says have carried out genocide and other atrocities in territory it controls. Since fighting between the rival military factions erupted in April 2023, more than 150,000 people have been killed and about 12 million have been forced from their homes.

Israel has continued to violate its ceasefire agreement with Hamas, launching attacks across Gaza that killed at least four Palestinians and wounded several others on Monday. The strikes came as heavy rains flooded the tents of displaced Palestinians, who’ve been forced to shelter outdoors after Israel’s assault left some 90% of Gaza’s buildings damaged or destroyed. On Monday, three Palestinian children were injured in two separate explosions in Gaza City, apparently caused by unexploded Israeli ordnance.

Meanwhile, the U.S.- and Israel-backed so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation says it has ended its operations in Gaza. The group’s aid distribution points were widely condemned by human rights groups as “death traps,” with the U.N. reporting more than 850 Palestinians were killed while attempting to access food — even as Israeli authorities barred the U.N. and international aid organizations from bringing food and basic goods into Gaza.

Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen is calling on the Trump administration to secure the release of a 16-year-old Palestinian American citizen from Florida who was arrested by Israeli soldiers during an early-morning raid on his family’s West Bank home in February. Mohammed Ibrahim has reportedly suffered beatings in Israeli detention and has lost a considerable amount of weight. This is Senator Van Hollen.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen: “This is an American kid, so you would think that the United States government would be doing everything possible to secure his release. But they’re not. After all, we have a very close relationship with Israel. United States taxpayers provide billions of dollars to the Netanyahu government and the state of Israel.”

The White House has acknowledged that U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee met secretly with the convicted spy Jonathan Pollard at the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem in July. Pollard is a former U.S. Navy intelligence officer sentenced to life in prison for stealing classified U.S. material and sharing it with Israel. Pollard served 30 years in a federal prison before he was granted parole under President Obama in 2015. He moved to Israel in 2020.

In Ukraine, at least six people were killed in the capital Kyiv overnight as Russia launched a wave of missile and drone attacks, targeting buildings and energy infrastructure. Separately, six people, including two children, were wounded in Russian attacks on the port city of Odesa. Ukraine countered with drone attacks that killed three people and injured eight others in Russia’s southern Rostov region.

The violence came hours after talks on a U.S.-backed peace plan wrapped up in Geneva and as U.S. Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll reportedly headed to Abu Dhabi for talks with a Russian delegation and Ukraine’s intelligence chief. On Monday, Moscow rejected a Ukrainian and European Union-backed 19-point counterproposal to the 28-point peace plan supported by President Trump.

The Trump administration has suspended all green card applications submitted by refugees who were admitted into the U.S. under President Biden. Trump officials are also reportedly planning to track down and reinterview refugees who came to the U.S. between January 2021 and February 2025. That’s according to the Associated Press, which obtained a memo signed by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Joseph Edlow saying the Biden administration prioritized “expediency” and “quantity” in admitting refugees, and not “detailed screening and vetting.” But advocates have refuted those claims, as refugees often wait years before they’re even permitted to enter the U.S. after strict vetting during the application process. An estimated 200,000 refugees were admitted into the U.S. by Biden.

A federal appeals court has temporarily blocked the Trump administration from expanding its rapid deportations of some immigrants, citing due process violations. For some three decades, the U.S. government has fast-tracked the removal of immigrants apprehended at the U.S.-Mexico border. When Trump returned to office, expedited removals were then expanded to include immigrants arrested anywhere in the United States and who the Trump administration claimed could not prove they had lived in the U.S. for at least two years.

In related news, the Trump administration is moving to revoke temporary protected status for immigrants from Burma and Somalia. This will impact hundreds of Somali immigrants living in Minnesota and nearly 4,000 immigrants from Burma, who will now face deportation. TPS is a relief granted for immigrants fleeing war and other disasters that have made their home countries unsafe. The Trump administration has already revoked the relief for hundreds of thousands of other immigrants, including Haitians, Venezuelans, Afghans and Nicaraguans.

The Trump administration lied to a federal judge, claiming Costa Rica was unwilling to accept Kilmar Abrego Garcia if the United States attempted to deport him to the Central American country. The Washington Post reports a Costa Rican official rebutted the Trump administration’s claims in court that the only viable destination to deport the Maryland father, who is originally from El Salvador, is the West African nation of Liberia. The Trump administration has previously attempted to deport Abrego Garcia to other nations where the U.S. now has so-called third country agreements, including Uganda and Eswatini, countries Abrego Garcia has no ties to. Abrego Garcia is awaiting trial for human smuggling charges, which he and his legal team say were fabricated by the Trump administration after they illegally sent him to CECOT, the maximum-security prison in El Salvador.

In Florida, at least 31 protesters were arrested Saturday outside the Krome ICE jail in Miami, a facility that is plagued by reports of abuse and inhumane conditions. Dozens gathered to protest Trump’s aggressive immigration crackdown and to demand Krome be shut down. Miami-Dade County Sheriff’s deputies made the arrests.

Protester: “I’m being arrested for peacefully protesting the horrible treatment of human beings by ICE agents.”

Sheriff’s deputy: “It’s called obstruction, obstruction of justice.”

Protester: “These people are being treated horribly. They’re human beings.”

Georgia Congressmember Marjorie Taylor Greene is predicting other Republican lawmakers could soon resign from Congress, after she stunned Washington, D.C., on Friday by announcing she’ll step away from the House of Representatives in January. Her surprise resignation will leave Republicans with a slim majority; they currently hold 219 seats compared to Democrats’ 213. Marjorie Taylor Greene spent years as a leader of the MAGA movement but had an acrimonious split with President Trump after she condemned Israel’s assault on Gaza as a “genocide,” called on Congress to address the spiraling cost of healthcare, and cast a deciding vote on a discharge petition calling for the release of the Epstein files. That led Trump to withdraw his endorsement while accusing her of being a “traitor.” This is an excerpt of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s resignation speech.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene: “I refuse to be a battered wife, hoping it all goes away and gets better. If I am cast aside by the president and the MAGA political machine and replaced by neocons, Big Pharma, Big Tech, military-industrial-war complex, foreign leaders and the elite donor class, that can never, ever relate to real Americans, then many common Americans have been cast aside and replaced, as well.”

On Sunday, Marjorie Taylor Greene denied a report from Time magazine that she “privately told allies” she was considering a presidential bid, rejecting the report as a “complete lie.”

The Pentagon has launched an investigation into Arizona Senator Mark Kelly after he joined five other Democrats in a video reminding U.S. service members that they have a duty to disobey unlawful orders. On Monday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a social media post that Kelly, who’s a retired U.S. Navy captain, falls under the Uniform Code of Military Justice and could be recalled to active duty to face a court-martial. This comes after President Trump accused the six Democratic lawmakers, who are military or CIA veterans, of ”SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!” and shared a social media post calling for them to be hanged.

A federal judge has thrown out criminal indictments against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, after determining the interim U.S. attorney hand-picked by President Trump to bring the cases was not lawfully appointed. Lindsey Halligan, a former insurance attorney with no prosecutorial experience, was named interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia in September after Trump’s previous hand-picked U.S. attorney resigned under pressure from the White House for refusing to bring criminal charges against Trump’s critics. The cases were dismissed “without prejudice,” meaning the Trump administration could try to bring another indictment against Letitia James; meanwhile, the statute of limitations in Comey’s case expired in September.

The Environmental Protection Agency has approved the use of two new pesticides that contain fluorinated substances commonly referred to as “forever chemicals” because they take centuries to break down in the environment. The EPA also announced it is relaxing a rule mandating that companies report products containing the chemicals, and proposed further weakening limits in drinking water. For decades, forever chemicals have been used to produce countless industrial and consumer goods, even though they have been linked to cancer and birth defects for over half a century.

The oldest survivor of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre has died at the age of 111. Viola Ford Fletcher was 7 years old when she survived a wave of attacks by racist white mobs who set fire to homes, businesses and churches in Greenwood, a thriving African American business district in Tulsa, Oklahoma, known as “Black Wall Street.” Fletcher devoted her life to raising awareness about the Tulsa race massacre. In 2021, she testified to Congress ahead of the 100th anniversary of the massacre.

Viola Ford Fletcher: “I will never forget the violence of the white mob when we left our home. I still see Black men being shot, Black bodies lying in the street. I still smell smoke and see fire. I still see Black businesses being burned. I still hear airplanes flying overhead. I hear the screams. I have lived through the massacre every day. A country may forget this history, but I cannot. I will not. And other survivors do not, and our descendants do not.”

Viola Ford Fletcher’s 2023 memoir is titled “Don’t Let Them Bury My Story.” Last year, the Oklahoma Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit brought by Fletcher and other remaining survivors who sought reparations from Tulsa.