Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy described the fiasco as a “botched Bay of Pigs like paramilitary operation.” “Now, [Senators] Tim Kaine, Tom Udall and I are asking the administration a simple question: What did they know, and if they didn’t know, why not?” he added.

President Nicholas Maduro, whose forces appear to have had knowledge of the attack before it took place, is certain who was behind it. “The United States government is fully and completely involved in this defeated raid,” he said, describing it as a “covert operation ordered by Donald Trump,” supported by Colombian President Ivan Duque and self-declared U.S.-backed “interim president” Juan Guaidó, outsourced to “professional American mercenaries” on a mission to assassinate him.

Trump officially denied all knowledge of the weekend’s events. But Secretary of State Mike Pompeo contradicted the president’s words on Wednesday, stating only that “there was no U.S. government direct involvement,” although he did admit that he had known who bankrolled the failed project, promising to divulge the information “at an appropriate time.”

However, in an interview with CNN on Wednesday, one of the coup’s organizers, Juan José Rendon, may have let slip that the Trump administration was even more heavily involved than it concedes. Referring to a $212.9 million contract they signed with Guaidó in October to overthrow the government, Rendon explained that it was above board as they were merely capturing and delivering to justice members of the Maduro regime who have an arrest warrant in the United States. The problem is that those warrants, along with the $15 million bounty placed on Maduro’s head, were only made public in March. Therefore, if Rendon spoke correctly, it indicates his team may have had months of contact and cooperation with the U.S. Department of State.

The two Americans captured have been named as Airan Berry and Luke Denman. Both are ex-Special Forces and honed their skills in the U.S. wars in the Middle East. Denman’s family made an impassioned plea for his safe return. “He deserves to come home,” said his brother Mark, claiming that, “Luke’s motivation has always been to help others in any way he can… He thinks of kids who are being harmed and innocent people who are suffering and I’m sure this was his motivation to do this.” Perhaps he had not watched Denman’s interview broadcast on Venezuelan television, because the 34-year-old Texan said he participated after the promise of being paid between $50-100,000 for the job, describing himself as a “mercenary” for hire.

Both Berry and Denman worked for Silvercorp USA, a private security firm set up in 2018 by another former soldier, Jordan Goudreau. The company began by trying to sell school security services, but Goudreau and his men diversified, even being directly employed as private security guards by the Trump team at their rallies.

If you were to tell me that a QAnon guy (Airan Seth Berry followed hashtags QArmy and QAnon8kun on twitter) would end up on Venezuelan state media confessing to a coup — in the middle of COVID — I would have been like lol gtfo. But here we are. pic.twitter.com/jMKgWK7mB6

— Italien Feeld