Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced “Operation Southern Spear” on Thursday as tensions between the U.S. and Venezuela, and the U.S. and its European allies, mount over the Trump administration’s lethal strikes on drug traffickers.

Hegseth announced the new mission in a post on X. It was not immediately clear whether the operation is a new label on the ongoing operations against drug cartels in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean, or whether it represents some expanded operation in the administration’s efforts against the cartels.

“Led by Joint Task Force Southern Spear and [U.S. Southern Command], this mission defends our Homeland, removes narco-terrorists from our Hemisphere, and secures our Homeland from the drugs that are killing our people. The Western Hemisphere is America’s neighborhood – and we will protect it,” Hegseth said.

The War secretary said that the operation was ordered by President Donald Trump.

The operations announcement comes as tensions have flared this week between Washington and Caracas. Earlier this week, Venezuela announced a “massive mobilization” of its military and held drills on Wednesday that involved an estimated 200,000 soldiers. Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López said the military exercises were in response to the “imperialist threat” from the United States.

Venezuela’s show of force came as the USS Gerald R Ford and other vessels arrived in the region after the aircraft carrier was repositioned to the Caribbean Sea. The Ford is the United States’ largest and most technologically advanced warship.

The Trump administration has positioned U.S. military assets in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean to cut off water routes used by drug cartels to ship deadly chemicals into the United States. The U.S. military has destroyed around 20 boats and submarines that it said were trafficking drugs such as fentanyl and cocaine.

In response, some officials in Europe have been critical of the U.S. strikes, accusing the United States of violating “international law.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio responded to those complaints on Wednesday.

“I do find it interesting that all these countries want us to send and supply, for example, nuclear-capable Tomahawk missiles to defend Europe, but when the United States positions aircraft carriers in our hemisphere, where we live, somehow that’s a problem?” said Rubio. “I would say that the United States and this president has made very clear his job is to protect the United States from threats against the United States, and that is what he is doing in this operation.”

The sex scandal that erupted around former Rep. Matt Gaetz before his exit from Congress centered on a 17-year-old high schooler who was homeless and wanting cash to pay for braces, court records reveal.

The girl at the center of the scandal is now an adult, but back in 2017 when she met the then-congressman, she was a high school junior living in Florida and offering to have sex with men for money, according to court documents made public last month and first reported by The New York Times.

The woman’s attorney, Laura Wolf, told the Times that she and her client want the public to know some of the background involved in the Gaetz scandal.

“The vulnerable circumstances most crime victims face are rarely known to the public,” Wolf told the Times. “Although my client’s circumstances were revealed outside of her control, I hope it helps for the public to see a fuller and more human picture of her than the press has reported on to date.”

Gaetz has denied a core detail surrounding the scandal, that he had sex with the then 17-year-old girl.

“I never had sex with this person,” the former congressman told the Times in a text message. “This person threatened me with a lawsuit if I didn’t pay her $2.3 million dollars. … She never sued me because her story is fiction.”

Before she met Gaetz, the girl and her siblings split time living with each of her divorced parents. One of her parents was homeless and stayed in a shelter off and on. When the girl and her siblings stayed with that parent, they all stayed together at the shelter, according to Wolf.

The girl worked at McDonald’s to make money, according to a report by the House Ethics Committee on Gaetz. In an effort to make extra cash, the girl signed up on a website that offered to set up older men with younger women ages 18 and above for a “sugar dating” relationship.

Through the website, the girl first met Joel Greenberg, a Florida tax collector and friend of Gaetz. Greenberg paid the girl for sex multiple times before taking her to a July 15, 2017, party at the home of Chris Dorworth, then a lobbyist for Ballard Partners. Gaetz also attended the party and, according to the girl’s testimony to the Ethics Committee, had sex with the girl twice. One of those times allegedly took place on a “pool table or … air hockey table.”

In 2022, Greenberg was sentenced to over a decade in prison after pleading guilty to underage sex trafficking, wire fraud, stalking, and a host of other crimes. The Justice Department declined to prosecute Gaetz.