Trump Opens Venezuela Airspace for Commercial Flights 3 Weeks After Declaring the U.S. Now ‘Runs’ the Country

President Donald Trump said the United States will reopen all commercial airspace over Venezuela, a move he said will soon allow Americans to travel to the country.

Speaking during a cabinet meeting on Thursday, Jan. 29, the 79-year-old president told reporters he had informed acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodríguez that the changes would take effect by the end of the day.

“American citizens will be, very shortly, able to go to Venezuela, and they’ll be safe there,” Trump said. “It’s under very strong control.”

The announcement comes more than three weeks after U.S. military and law enforcement agencies carried out an overnight operation that captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, first lady Cilia Flores, on Saturday, Jan. 3.

After that operation, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an emergency Notice to Airmen prohibiting all civil flight operations of U.S. aircraft in Venezuelan airspace. The restriction covered all airspace over Venezuela’s land borders and extended into a portion of the southern Caribbean Sea.

The FAA — which oversees aviation within the U.S. and its territories — also closed the airspace it controls in the Eastern Caribbean. The San Juan flight information region, covering Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and surrounding waters, was shut down between Jan. 3 and Jan. 4, leaving thousands of travelers stranded across the Caribbean in early January.

Following Maduro’s capture, Trump said the U.S. planned to “run” the South American country.

“We’re going to get the oil flowing the way it should be… we’re gonna run it properly,” Trump said from his Palm Beach, Fla., residence on Jan. 3. “We’re gonna make sure the people of Venezuela are taken care of.”

According to The Associated Press, diplomatic relations between the two countries collapsed in 2019, when the U.S. State Department raised its travel advisory for Venezuela to its highest level and warned Americans not to visit.

As of Jan. 29, the State Department’s travel advisory for Venezuela remains a “Level 4: Do Not Travel.”

The airspace reopening has already prompted American Airlines to move toward resuming service. On Thursday, the carrier — the last U.S. airline operating in Venezuela before suspending flights in March 2019 — said it plans to return.

“We have a more than 30-year history connecting Venezolanos to the U.S., and we are ready to renew that incredible relationship,” Nat Pieper, American’s chief commercial officer, said in a Jan. 29 press release. “By restarting service to Venezuela, American will offer customers the opportunity to reunite with families and create new business and commerce with the United States.”

The airline said it will share more details in the coming months as it works “closely with federal authorities on all necessary permissions and security assessments.”