let s start with breaking news. president trump announcing moments ago an american prisoner, josh holt, will return from venezuela tonight and be reunited with his family. for the past two years, the former mormon missionary from utah has been jailed in venezuela, making pleas to the american government to come save him. the president tweeting just moments ago, looking forward to seeing joshua holt this evening in the white house. the great people of utah are celebrating. cnn s sarah westwood joins us from the white house to tell us more about holt s story and how his release came about. reporter: that s right. this morning president trump celebrating the release of an american, joshua holt, from a venezuelan prison where he s been since 2016. president trump, as you mentioned, tweeted twice, confirming the news that holt has been released. the holt family has confirmed
perhaps as early as last night? i definitely was surprised, as was everyone else, i m sure. for about two years holt has been in prison in venezuela on dubious weapons charges under the allegation that he s an american agent. he is a former mormon missionary. it s important to remember there are five other american citizens who are currently detained in venezuela. former citgo executives have been held without a trial. their cases haven t gotten much attention. it s a good thing for holt and his family that he s been released. there are other americans who are being held there as well. elizabeth: why now? what is the white house motivation for pushing for this release? why joshua? why not the others as well? do you have any insight into that? he has just been released. he hasn t even left venezuela yet. it might be too early to say. this comes after president trump tightened the sanctions on venezuela in response to their presidential election where the thoauthortarian leader won
think even the democrats are starting to feel that way. bret: is it your sense it will be effective january 1, 2018? i hope so. i hope so. that remains to be decided. bret: a lot in these final days. yeah, these kinds of things are difficult. i have to say mcconnell, our leader, is a master at this. he has lots of help from some of the rest of us too. bret: i want to talk about another important issue you ve been fighting for, this young man from utah, josh holt, 25 years old, pleading for his life. he s been in jail in venezuela on a weapons charge for now nearly 18 months. it was a phony charge to begin with. this guy is a mormon missionary who fell in love with a woman down there in venezuela, went down to pick her up and they threw him in jail. they framed him by saying he had illegal weapons in his
it s all types of other information coming out that has nothing to do with that. mueller got his job because the president of the united states fire the fbi director. i still say we can talk about the missteps. you can write a whole book about it. the fact is the american people are fair and the investigation doesn t find convincing evidence there was this type of collusion between team trump and the russian government, really all of this is a waste of time. what if they find something that leads them to believe there was something donald trump wanted to cover up about his family s past financial transactions or his own that would make you look like he possibly was colluding and therefore he fired comey and did other things to suggest the obstruction of justice. the american people are fair. what they throughout what they did with bill clinton was that they thought investigators
[indistinct] it was a gut wrenching window into the mind of an american held captive in venezuela. 25-year-old josh holt pleading for his life nearly 18 months after his arrest on what u.s. officials call trumped up gone and espionage charges. the mormon missionary family called the allegations income principal. i heard death in my child. it s not something that s easy. no parent should have to deal with it. this is their wedding day. holt went to venezuela to marry a fellow mormon he met online and start a family. less than two weeks later, they were imprisoned by the venezuelans. we have been living in a nightmare for 18 months. now he finds himself at the center of an international