1. United States
2. Mass.
3. Letter

Donald Trump ruins the holiday season for our troops by cancelling and restricting their leave for Thanksgiving and Christmas as he prepares to wage war against Venezuela. According to Kellie Meyer of NewsNation, the United States Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) is "restricting/limiting" leave over the holidays in "preparation for possible land strikes in the next 10 days to two weeks." The Trump administration has been vocally flirting with the idea of striking targets inside Venezuela as an escalation to the deadly, illegal strikes that the White House has been carrying out against alleged drug smugglers in the Caribbean. The fact that little to no fentanyl actually originates in Venezuela has not stopped the drums of war. This news comes on the same day that the United States officially designated the "Cartel de los Soles" a terrorist organization. According to the Trump administration, the cartel is a criminal organization embedded within the administration of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Many experts have suggested that the cartel does not exist at all and is simply a fabrication that the United States will use to justify a war similar to the imaginary weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Venezuela called the Cartel de los Soles narrative a "new and ridiculous lie from Secretary of State Marco Rubio" and a "vile lie to justify an illegitimate and illegal intervention against Venezuela under the classic U.S. format of regime change." One need not support the regime of Maduro to oppose this war. This is not about fighting drug trafficking as Trump has insisted, but rather a naked power grab aimed at seizing Venezuela's vast oil reserves. It also cannot be stressed enough how desperately Trump needs a distraction from his worsening Jeffrey Epstein scandal. A bloody, pointless, evil war would go a long way towards gobbling up headlines when the files are released in full. Please restore leave and stop Trump from invading Venezuela!