SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic, Feb 8,  (AP): The Trump administration on Thursday seized a second plane belonging to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro ’s government that is currently in the Dominican Republic. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio watched as American officials affixed the seizure warrant to the plane during a visit to Santo Domingo, the last stop of his five-nation tour of Latin America.

Carrying out the seizure required that Rubio sign off on a waiver to a freeze that President Donald Trump imposed on foreign aid to pay more than $230,000 in storage and maintenance fees, according to a State Department document obtained by The Associated Press. It also required approval by the US Department of Justice, which said the plane was used by a Venezuelan state-owned oil and natural gas company facing sanctions.

An investigation showed the company bought the plane in the US in 2017, sent it to Venezuela and it was serviced multiple times using American parts, the department said. The plane is a Dassault Falcon 200 that has been used by Maduro and top aides, including his vice president and defense minister, to travel the world, including visits to Greece, Turkey, Russia and Cuba, in what Washington says are violations of US sanctions, according to the State Department.

The seizure of the plane comes just a week after President Donald Trump's envoy for special missions, Richard Grenell, visited Caracas and met with Maduro to discuss the repatriation of Venezuelan nationals who illegally entered the United States. Grenell returned with six Americans who had been detained in Venezuela.

The US seized another of Maduro’s planes from the Dominican Republic in September 2024. At the time, the U.S. Justice Department said Maduro associates in late 2022 and early 2023 used a Caribbean-based shell company to hide their involvement in the purchase of the plane - a Dassault Falcon 900EX valued at $13 million - from a company in Florida. Related to Rubio’s first stop on his trip, he said Thursday that he was "not confused” about the status of an agreement about eliminating fees for U.S. warships to transit the Panama Canal and understood that Panama has to follow a legal process to take the step.