CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan opposition supporters have long hoped for the day when Nicolas Maduro would no longer be in power, a dream that came true when the authoritarian leader was taken away by the U.S. military. But while Maduro is in prison in New York on drug trafficking charges, the leaders of his repressive administration remain in power.
The country's opposition, backed by successive Republican and Democratic administrations in the US, has for years vowed to immediately replace Maduro with one of their own and restore democracy to the oil-rich country. But US President Donald Trump dealt them a heavy blow by allowing Maduro's Vice President Delcy Rodriguez to take control.
Meanwhile, most opposition leaders, including Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado, are in exile or prison.
“They were clearly unimpressed by the opposition's kind of unearthly magical realism that if they just nudged Maduro it would be an instant step toward democracy,” David Smilde, a Tulane University professor who has studied Venezuela for three decades, said of the Trump administration.
The US captured Maduro and first lady Cilia Flores in a military operation on Saturday, pushing them both out of their home at a military base in the Venezuelan capital Caracas. Hours later, Trump said the US would “run” Venezuela and expressed skepticism that Machado could ever become its leader.
“She has no domestic support, no domestic respect,” Trump told reporters. “She's a very nice woman, but she has no respect.”
Ironically, Machado's endless praise of the American president, including dedicating Trump's Nobel Peace Prize and supporting American campaigns to deport Venezuelan migrants and attack suspected drug traffickers in international waters, has lost her some domestic support.
The legitimate winner of the Venezuelan presidential election
Machado has emerged as Maduro's strongest opponent in years, but his government has banned her from running for president to prevent her from challenging (and likely defeating) him in the 2024 presidential election. She chose retired ambassador Edmundo González Urrutia to represent her on the ballot.
Officials loyal to the ruling party declared Maduro the winner just hours after polls closed, but Machado's well-organized campaign stunned the nation by compiling detailed vote tallies showing Gonzalez defeating Maduro by a 2-to-1 margin.
The United States and other countries recognized Gonzalez as the rightful winner.
But Venezuelans are calling Machado, not Gonzalez, the winner, and the charismatic opposition leader remains the voice of the campaign, courting international support and insisting that her movement will replace Maduro.
In her first television interview since Maduro's arrest, Machado effusively praised Trump and did not acknowledge his neglect of her opposition movement during the latest transfer of power.
“I spoke to President Trump on October 10th, the same day the award was announced, and it hasn't happened since,” she told Fox News on Monday. “What he has done, as I said, is historic and it is a huge step towards democratic transition.”
Hopes for new elections
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday appeared to backtrack on Trump's assertion that the US would “run” Venezuela. In the interview, Rubio insisted that Washington would use its control of Venezuela's oil industry to force policy changes and called the current government illegitimate. The country is home to the world's largest proven crude oil reserves.
Neither Trump nor Rodriguez have said when or if elections could take place in Venezuela.
Venezuela's constitution requires elections to be held within 30 days if the president becomes “permanently unavailable” to perform his duties. Reasons listed include death, resignation, removal from office or “abandonment” of duties declared by the National Assembly. This election schedule was strictly followed when Maduro's predecessor Hugo Chavez died of cancer in 2013.
On Tuesday, U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally who traveled with the president on Air Force One on Sunday, said he believed the election would happen but did not say when or how.
“We're going to build the country – from an infrastructure standpoint – and get closer to free elections,” the South Carolina Republican told reporters.
But Maduro's supporters in the High Court on Saturday, citing another provision of the constitution, declared Maduro's absence “temporary,” meaning there is no requirement for an election. Instead, the vice president, who is not an elected position, assumes office for a term of up to 90 days, with the possibility of an extension of up to six months if approved by the National Assembly, controlled by the ruling party.
Opposition faces challenges
Venezuela's Supreme Court made no mention of the 180-day deadline in its ruling, leading to speculation that Rodriguez may try to cling to power as she seeks to unite factions of the ruling party and shield it from what is sure to be a major electoral challenge.
Machado on Monday criticized Rodriguez as “one of the main architects of torture, persecution, corruption and drug trafficking … certainly not a person that international investors can trust.”
Even if elections take place, Machado and Gonzalez will first have to find a way back to Venezuela.
Gonzalez has been in exile in Spain since September 2024, while Machado left Venezuela last month when she made her first public appearance in 11 months to accept the Nobel Prize in Norway.
Ronal Rodriguez, a researcher at the Venezuelan Observatory at Colombia's Del Rosario University, said the Trump administration's decision to work with Rodriguez Cold harms the nation's “democratic spirit.”
“In the 2024 elections, the opposition is united with the desire to change the situation in Venezuela through democratic means, and this is embodied by Maria Corina Machado and obviously Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia,” he said. “To ignore this is to belittle, almost humiliate, Venezuelans.”
