Democrat opposition to President Trump’s extraction of Nicolás Maduro in “a very exquisite and specific limited action” Saturday shows “that Trump Derangement Syndrome isn’t just the domestic policy of the Democrats, but it’s also their foreign policy, evidently,” says Missouri Sen. Eric Schmitt.

“I’m convinced at this point,” he told Fox News’ Harris Faulkner Monday, “that if President Trump won the battle against cancer and cured cancer, the Democrats would take the side of cancer. It’s totally insane, but here we go again.”

Observers have noted how Democrats once preached a bullish sermon on taking down the illegitimate ruler in Venezuela, but now are attacking Trump for actually having done so – and without casualties.

“Let’s go after the drug lords where they live, with an international strike force. There must be no safe haven for these narco-terrorists – and they must know it,” Biden said in a clip from 1989 replayed by Faulkner.

In addition, Democrat Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut posted on X Monday publicizing his appearance on the former MSNBC “to talk about what we know about Trump’s illegal invasion of Venezuela.” Yet in 2019 Murphy challenged Trump to “make the realist case for intervention in Venezuela (getting rid of Maduro is good for the United States) rather than trying to pretend his Administration all of the sudden cares about toppling anti-democratic regimes.”

“It’s crazy. The hypocrisy knows no bounds,” Schmitt told Faulkner, adding:

“President Trump has made the realist case, actually, of defending our Western Hemisphere from a narcoterrorist who was trafficking drugs, emptied their prisons and sent those illegal immigrants into the United States, and was also playing host to the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] and other malign actors in his country who are a direct threat to the United States of America.

“This was a very successful operation by our military. Nobody else in the world could do this. This was five hours on the ground. Nobody else could coordinate this. Nobody else could do it. Nobody has the capability.

“It’s also, interestingly, exposed some of the weaknesses in the Chinese and Russian equipment that was on the ground there. … All of this is good news for the American people. People are safer with Maduro out. This was a very exquisite and specific limited action here, and the people of Venezuela will ultimately benefit, along with, most importantly, the American people and our interest in the Western Hemisphere.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio noted Sunday that Biden put a multimillion-dollar bounty on Maduro, but it took Trump to act on it.

“I agree with Secretary Rubio,” Schmitt told Faulkner. “There’s a big difference between tough talk and actually taking action – and by the way, doing it in a very thoughtful and specific and strategic way, which is exactly what happened here.”

Schmitt noted the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, which warned Europe not to further interfere in the Western Hemisphere, has been rekindled and retooled by President Trump.

“We have a very keen interest in what happens in our own hemisphere,” Schmitt told Faulkner. “This is our hemisphere. This is our hemisphere, and we need to protect the American people. So, we cannot allow some tin-pot dictator in Venezuela or anywhere else to funnel drugs – killing, poisoning Americans – sending their worst-of-the-worst to murder Americans, and again, playing host to some of the worst actors, our adversaries around the world.

“President Trump, when he says he’s going to do something, he does it. And I think the world is watching. They should understand that this guy isn’t playing games. This is the Trump corollary to the Monroe Doctrine: When he says he’s going to do something, he’s going to do it.

“He gave Maduro plenty of off-ramps, but this guy wanted to be the tough guy. He wanted to talk tough, and, you know, ‘come take [me].’ Well, that’s exactly what happened.

“The American people, I think, should be very proud that we have a president that means what he says and follows through on things, and doesn’t just post rewards for other people to do things or have some value statement about something. He actually goes and does it. The American people in our hemisphere are safer because of it.”

On Fox News’ Sunday Briefing, Schmitt had expounded on his view of the Maduro extraction.

“I think this is clearly a law enforcement action,” he told host Jacqui Heinrich. “The military was there to provide support to make sure an indicted criminal would be arrested. Think: if this was something bigger than that, the military posture would have been much different. This was extracting one individual. The vice president in Venezuela has now been sworn in as president.

“No military on the planet could pull this off, just like no military on the planet could drop bunker busting bombs on something the size of a kitchen table to disarm, effectively, the nuclear program of Iran. And so, the world is watching that. This is military might at its finest, and I think that is a good deterrent. …

“When President Trump talks about this sort of Trump-corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, [it’s] a shift away from the last 30 years with their obsession of the Middle East and in Europe, back to the Western Hemisphere, our homeland. …

“So, we’re just simply not going to tolerate these tin-pot dictators who flood our country with criminals, who flood our country with drugs, that have hosted the Chinese and other adversaries as a base of operation for them – we’re not going to allow that in the Western Hemisphere. …

“The permanent Washington class … has no problem with defending the borders of other countries. I mean, Joe Biden had a blank check for an endless war in Ukraine to defend the sovereignty of that country, but cared very little about the sovereignty of our own country.

“This president is saying that you will respect our borders. We’re not going to allow you to flood illegal immigrants in here, gang members. They emptied their prisons in Caracas, sent them to the United States. They’re sending drugs to the United States. We’re not going to tolerate that anymore.

“Some of the same critics of this have no problem with sending our blood and treasure halfway around the world, but somehow they’re being critical of us defending our own neck of the woods so that our backyard is safe for Americans. …

“We do not want to have China operating freely in Venezuela in our backyard, just like we don’t want China operating both ends of the Panama Canal. So, a message is being delivered that we have core strategic interests in the Western Hemisphere, and we will use our military might to defend those, if necessary. I think this is a very important pivot, and something very different than we’ve seen over the last 30 years, which I applaud.”