Terry Cole, Administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), accused Venezuela of collaborating with Colombian guerrilla groups, the National Liberation Army (ELN) and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), to traffic record amounts of cocaine to Mexican cartels that then smuggle the drugs into the United States. Cole described Venezuela as a "narco-terrorist state" due to its alleged cooperation with these groups. The DEA's allegations have been met with strong denial from the Venezuelan government, which condemned the accusations as an imperialist attack. Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez labeled the DEA as "the biggest drug cartel in the world." Meanwhile, the 2025 World Drug Report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) indicates that Venezuela remains free of illicit drug cultivation and is only minimally mentioned as a trafficking route to the U.S. and Europe. Additionally, U.S. authorities have linked the Cartel of the Suns, a narcotrafficking organization, to President Nicolás Maduro's administration.