Rarely has a policy document gone from publication to implementation as quickly as President Donald Trump‘s 2025 National Security Strategy. Released less than a month ago, it makes a clear case not just for Trump’s intervention in Venezuela, but for an active and honest defense of American interests across the globe. Those arguing that the “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine signals some new “sphere of influence” thinking in the White House that would abandon Taiwan or Ukraine to China and Russia should reread what the administration actually released.
“The Monroe Doctrine is a big deal,” Trump said during his Saturday press conference following the apprehension of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro. “But we’ve superseded it by a lot, by a real lot,” Trump continued with his signature salesman flair. “They now call it the ‘Donroe Doctrine.’”
It is unclear if the “Donroe Doctrine” formulation will catch on, but it is admittedly less clunky than the aforementioned, “Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine,” which was mentioned in the National Security Strategy. No matter what you call it, even before Trump took decisive action in Venezuela, critics were using the term to accuse the Trump administration of seeking to retreat into a “sphere of influence” mindset that would allow China to assert dominance over Taiwan and Russia to complete its invasion of Ukraine.
These were false readings of the National Security Strategy from the start. On Taiwan, the document clearly identifies both the economic, “Taiwan’s dominance of semiconductor production,” and military — the island “splits Northeast and Southeast Asia into two distinctive theaters” — importance of the island and promises to “build a military capable of denying aggression anywhere in the First Island Chain.” And on Ukraine, the document calls the “expeditious cessation of hostilities in Ukraine” and its “survival as a viable state,” a “core interest of the United States.” This is not a document telling Taiwan and Ukraine to fend for themselves. Quite the opposite.
If anything, the removal of Maduro from power was a huge blow to China and Russia and a boost to Taiwan and Ukraine. That is definitely how the leaders of Taiwan are seeing it because Trump acted not only while a Chinese delegation was in Caracas visiting Maduro, but the U.S. military successfully evaded Chinese defense systems to capture Maduro. U.S. defense technology outperformed expectations, a fact that can only deter Chinese military action against Taiwan.
The argument put forward by Sen Mark Warner (D-VA) that Trump’s capture of Maduro somehow legitimizes Chinese and Russian aggression near their borders is equally ridiculous. Russia has been violating Ukrainian sovereignty for years, long before Trump became president. If it could capture Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, it would have done so by now. But it won’t because it cannot. The same goes for China’s decadeslong fixation on Taiwan. It is a goal that long predates Trump, as do China’s tactics of threatening the island.
MAMDANI’S COLLECTIVIST VISION FOR AMERICA
The Trump administration has no desire to invade and occupy Venezuela as China wants to do with Taiwan and Russia is doing with Ukraine. Maduro was an illegitimate dictator who was killing, raping, and suppressing the people of his country. All the Trump administration wants is a stable, legitimate government that will contribute to order and prosperity in our hemisphere.
Properly understood, the Donroe Doctrine is not an endorsement of spheres of influence but a rejection of passivity masquerading as restraint. It draws a sharp line between aggression and enforcement, between conquest and accountability. Maduro’s apprehension was not about territorial ambition but about restoring order in America’s own hemisphere while signaling that U.S. commitments elsewhere remain firm. Taiwan and Ukraine are not bargaining chips to be traded away, but strategic interests explicitly defended in U.S. policy. Far from inviting predation, Trump’s actions demonstrate that American power, when used decisively and selectively, still deters it.