Delcy Rodríguez

Nine months after the US’ January 3 military strikes and kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the Venezuelanalysis team got together to take stock of a whirlwind of changes in Caracas’ domestic and foreign policies.

Lead editor Ricardo Vaz was joined by fellow staff members Jessica Dos Santos, Silvana Solano, and Lucas Koerner. They broke down the US’ semi-colonial regime, the gaps between the official discourse and reality, and the prospects for the different political sectors.

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Note: this episode was recorded in Spanish. See the YouTube video above for a subtitled version.

Between smiles and a handshake, Venezuelan Acting President Delcy Rodríguez thanked US President Donald Trump for “supporting the country’s return to multilateral forums,” following a face-to-face meeting on September 22 that she called “historic.”

In her address before the UN General Assembly one day later, Rodríguez reiterated her gratitude to Trump while promising a “democratic transformation” of her country. The acting leader’s trip to New York, a mere nine months after the January 3 US bombings and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores, perfectly encapsulated the Venezuelan government’s international and domestic realignment with US imperialism in general and its MAGA faction in particular.

In her speech, she euphemistically called the January 3 military strikes “the outcome of the exhaustion of domestic politics and heightened confrontation with the US,” basically holding Venezuela partially responsible for the imperialist attack it suffered.

The abandonment of Maduro

Rodríguez’s trip was as symbolic for what was said as for what was left unsaid. The acting leader and her entourage heaped praise on Trump and took turns posing for pictures. Rodríguez also maintained an undignified silence when Trump, addressing the UN, gloated about the January 3 military operation and abduction of Maduro, whom he called an “outlaw dictator,” while shamelessly boasting that “to the victor belong the spoils.”

Maduro and Flores – currently detained in Brooklyn just 10 miles from UN headquarters and facing a show trial on ludicrous “narcoterrorism” charges – were not worth a single mention by Rodríguez. This stance has been backed by pro-government pundits who are increasingly dropping the “acting” label when referring to Rodríguez.

Her government has effectively undermined Maduro and Flores’ sovereign immunity argument to get their charges dismissed. US Justice Department prosecutors told the court that Caracas, via its embassy in the US, had advocated to the State Department for Rodríguez to receive head-of-state immunity in an unrelated civil lawsuit in Florida. But, Venezuelan authorities have declined to do the same vis-à-vis Maduro and Flores in what the US Justice Department called “devastating silence.”

The official indifference is even more remarkable given Flores’ documented health issues, heavily aggravated by the brutal kidnapping, which led defense attorneys to request that she be moved to house arrest during the trial. This silence contrasts with the Maduro government’s loud defense of Alex Saab, which repeatedly brought up his health issues under incarceration during the international campaign for his release.

Saab is another prime example of the Rodríguez administration’s pragmatic rapprochement with Washington. He was irregularly handed over to US agencies in May and recently pleaded guilty in a US federal court in Miami, promising to cooperate against unnamed Venezuelan officials.

An imperial satellite

The Venezuelan leadership’s diplomatic activity in New York more broadly showcased a new foreign policy direction that is now unmistakably marching to Washington’s drum.

Rodríguez held talks with International Monetary Fund and World Bank representatives, deepening reengagement with the Washington-based financial institutions that former President Hugo Chávez denounced as instruments of US imperialism and booted them out of the country. The specter of another IMF loan-and-adjustment package returns as the Rodríguez administration begins negotiations to restructure the country’s enormous and illegitimate debt.

In addition, Rodríguez held sideline meetings with US allies only, such as Netherlands PM Rob Jetten, Trinidad and Tobago PM Kamla Persad-Bissessar and Chilean President José Antonio Kast. Rodríguez also hosted Paraguayan President Santiago Peña in Caracas before flying to the US. 

The right-wing Chilean and Paraguayan administrations had firmly backed US regime change efforts in Venezuela, leading the Maduro government to sever ties. Trinidad and Tobago’s case was even more egregious, with Caracas suspending all cooperation, including in key cross-border natural gas projects, after Port of Spain endorsed Washington’s military buildup and extrajudicial boat bombings on Venezuela’s doorstep in late 2025.

Rodríguez and her team also broke with the Chavista tradition of holding meetings with global majority countries similarly under Washington’s gun, especially allies and strategic partners like Cuba, Iran, China and Russia. A customary event in Harlem, alongside Cuban officials and international solidarity movements, was scrapped as well.

The acting president’s UN address exposed how anti-imperialism and the defense of multipolarity have vanished from the official discourse. Absent was the hitherto denunciation of Washington’s criminal wars across the globe, replaced by a vague expression of solidarity with “peoples who suffer war.” Nor was there any condemnation of US economic sanctions, which remain in place against Venezuela and its former allies.

Rodríguez offered no words of support for Cuba as it faces a US blockade that gets more murderous by the day. There was no mention of Palestine either. Before January 3, Venezuelan representatives had never wasted an opportunity to reiterate support for the Palestinian cause and to expose the international community’s failure to rein in the genocidal, Western-sponsored settler colony.

In contrast, Venezuela joined the US, Israel, Ukraine, Western European countries and Latin American right-wing governments in boycotting the UN’s commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Durban Declaration. The 2001 World Conference Against Racism marked a milestone in the ongoing struggle to end racism and colonialism, provoking the ire of the US and Israel, which have led boycotts of every one of its commemorations.

Fuel for a sputtering empire

Along with the 180-degree foreign policy shift, the Rodríguez administration has moved to restructure the economy to the benefit of a declining US hegemon reeling from its strategic defeat in the war against Iran.

With US officials’ input and supervision, Venezuelan authorities have overhauled energy and mining laws in the interest of multinational corporations, slashing taxes and royalties as well as ceding operational and commercial control. Corporate executives, often shepherded by Trump aides, have paraded through the presidential palace to sign agreements carving up Venezuela’s immense subsoil resources.

A recent oil deal with the Trump administration, which Rodríguez also hailed as “historic,” will turn over 17 prime oilfields holding more than a fifth of Venezuela’s crude reserves to a private petroleum company, NABEP, controlled by the Pentagon. Furthermore, the US State Department will be able to buy 20 percent of NABEP’s output at cost, while having a right of first refusal for the remaining 80 percent, for which a Venezuelan oil official promised a major “sales discount.” In other words, Venezuela is going to supply energy below market price to the imperial war machine.

Whatever revenue is ultimately left for Caracas is still going to be controlled by the US Treasury Department, under what Venezuelan state oil company (PDVSA) chief defended as a “state-to-state agreement.” A recent Financial Times report revealed that the White House is presently barring Venezuela from paying dividends to Russian and Chinese joint venture partners in a flagrant attempt to drive them out.

Washington’s semi-colonial control extends beyond privileged access to natural resources, including strategic minerals. A looming privatization drive and debt restructuring process are likely to further entrench Venezuelan dependence on Western monopoly capital. At the same time, the US is also looking to turn the South American country into a captive market for its heavily subsidized agricultural output. Venezuela’s imports of staples such as rice and corn have skyrocketed this year, seriously threatening national production, especially small and mid-size campesino farms supplying much of the country’s food.

(Ab)uses of history

The speed and scope of Caracas’ realignment with Washington has made it an uphill battle for those still insisting that the acting Rodríguez government is merely conducting a “tactical retreat” without straying from the Bolivarian Revolution’s strategic horizon.

One early line of argument was to invoke historical examples, such as the Brest-Litovsk treaty, to rationalize difficult concessions at gunpoint. However, the analogy grew ever more dubious with the passing months, as the Bolsheviks never renounced their anti-imperialist internationalism nor the nascent socialist state’s sovereignty over the commanding heights of the economy.

The argument that subordinating the economy to US-led capital was akin to China’s post-1978 opening up belies the reality that Venezuela does not even manage its own export revenues and must have its expenses approved by the US State Department, subject to auditing by CIA-linked firms like Deloitte.

Venezuelan government officials and unofficial spokespeople have also abused examples related to Chávez, namely his call for troops to stand down in the failed 1992 insurrection and the fact that he did not martyr himself in the 2002 coup that briefly overthrew his democratically-elected government. However, in both cases, Chávez never surrendered his core principles concerning independence and sovereignty. In 2002, he allowed himself to be taken prisoner by the putschists to avoid a bloodbath, but he did not resign and would not have sat quietly if Venezuela were turned into a US semi-colony overnight. On multiple occasions, Chávez underscored he was prepared to fight and die on the frontlines should Venezuela face an Iraq-style US invasion.

There are other historical analogies that are, unfortunately, more appropriate. Iraq after the US invasion, like Venezuela, to this day does not control its oil revenues, which are deposited in a New York Federal Reserve account. Iraq was until recently under US military occupation, hosting some two dozen bases – a possibility that Trump has recently left open for Venezuela. In past months, the US has carried out extrajudicial executions on Venezuelan soil and deployed military assets in the wake of July’s double earthquake, including temporarily taking over operations at the Simón Bolívar International Airport and La Guaira port.

Egypt under President Anwar Sadat is likewise a very instructive precedent. Sadat never renounced his predecessor Gamal Abdel Nasser, simply presenting his program as a “correction” of past mistakes. Yet he progressively dismantled the achievements of Nasserism, rolling back land reform and industrialization policies in favor of imperialist capital. Sadat also realigned Egypt from the Soviet Union to the US camp, going on to reestablish ties with Israel and abandon the Palestinian cause.

Vietnam: The forgotten analogy

Lacking justifications for the new alliance with the Trump administration, Venezuelan government officials and influencers have resorted to straw man arguments, claiming that the “international left” wanted the Venezuelan people to immolate themselves by confronting a vastly superior military foe.

The official rhetoric eclipses what was until recently Caracas’ preferred historical analogy: Vietnam. In late 2025, as the US ramped up its military buildup, Venezuelan leaders warned that Trump would face a “second Vietnam” if he dared to attack. There were months of military drills and detailed preparations across the country, consistent with Venezuela’s asymmetric doctrine of “prolonged people’s war”. 

Ultimately it is impossible to know how much resistance Venezuela could have mounted against the US onslaught because the leadership opted not to fight. US air superiority and electronic warfare notwithstanding, Venezuelan defense officials have neglected to explain why only one of Venezuela’s 5,000 Russian-made Igla-S manpads – ideal for taking down low-flying helicopters and combat aircraft – was used. Venezuela’s armed forces offered no organized resistance on that fateful morning, leaving Maduro’s Cuban security detail virtually alone to confront the invader in what reportedly still proved a fiercely heroic firefight that left 32 Cubans dead.

Though Venezuela might have been unable to avoid decapitation of its top leadership – either via capture or assassination – it could have raised the costs for the US empire to a politically unacceptable degree, potentially miring it in the sort of Iraq-style quagmire that the Trump administration most feared. 

Instead, almost overnight, the acting government seamlessly pivoted from vowing to combat imperialism by all means necessary to fawning over Trump and his underlings. Promises that not a “single drop” of Venezuelan oil would be shipped to the US in case of an attack were replaced by risible claims that supplying crude at cost to the Pentagon was Chávez’s plan all along.

Unable to present a convincing case for the domestic and foreign policy U-turns, official and unofficial government spokespeople have also lashed out at criticism from the Latin American left. Most recently, former Colombian President Gustavo Petro slammed the Rodríguez administration for giving away the nation’s oil to Trump. Caracas responded with ad hominem invectives.

At Washington’s behest, Venezuela has also halted all subsidized oil shipments to Cuba, which has added to the island’s gravest energy crisis in its history. Cuba’s Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío recently said that Venezuela remained a “friendly” country, but added that “ally is too strong a word.”

The cost of capitulation 

The human toll of resistance, whether in sanctions-besieged Venezuela or on the battlefields of West Asia, is always immense. However, as national liberation movements have long understood, the price of capitulation is inevitably higher, especially in the medium and long term. Chávez and Maduro clearly grasped this reality, rallying the masses to withstand decades of US hybrid warfare and forging close alliances with anti-imperialist states from Cuba to Iran. 

The cost of submission, meanwhile, is being borne by the Venezuelan laboring classes, from small farmers hard hit by US agricultural dumping to the urban semi-proletariat devastated by spiraling inflation resulting from Washington’s pilfering of the nation’s export earnings. 

For its part, Venezuela’s comprador bourgeoisie, in both its traditional and emergent fractions, stands to reap fabulous rewards from the demolition of the legislative pillars of the Bolivarian Revolution – viz., hydrocarbons, mining, housing and real estate, or forthcoming axing of labor and land laws – reasserting itself as a servile intermediary for US imperialism. 

There is no better example than NABEP owner Alejandro Betancourt, an oil mogul who amassed a fortune from often-unfulfilled state contracts dating back to 2009 and was hand-picked by the Trump administration as a middleman in the 25-year agreement backstopped by the Pentagon. The White House went as far as pressuring domestic and foreign courts to drop money laundering accusations against Betancourt.

Rodríguez and her leadership faction likewise benefit from what analyst William Serafino has called the new regime of “co-government” with the Trump White House, tying their fortunes to the latter to outflank rivals and solidify the strategic alliance with local and imperialist capital. 

The current acting president is one of the architects of the post-2018 neoliberal economic package that was the fulcrum of a new governability pact with the local bourgeoisie, freezing wages and social spending in exchange for social “peace”. Indeed, as then vice president, Rodríguez reportedly brought Betancourt back to Venezuela in 2023, shuttering an investigation into his alleged corruption and key role in financing the self-proclaimed Juan Guaidó “interim presidency” during the first Trump administration. The episode is symptomatic of the Venezuelan government’s Faustian gambit to appease business sectors and maintain a modest economic recovery under crushing sanctions, but at the cost of slowly eroding its popular support base.

The Maduro administration’s concessions hollowed out the Bolivarian Revolution’s sovereign edifice but its institutional foundations remained formally intact alongside the internationalist geopolitical scaffolding binding Venezuela to the broader Axis of Resistance. The post-January 3 semi-colonial offensive has set about demolishing this structure of political-military and economic independence. While the destruction can be repaired through sustained bottom-up mobilization advancing a national popular alternative to capitulation, it will likely be the outcome of a medium- and long-term process. Nevertheless, there are growing signs of revolutionary movements and intellectuals organizing to confront the US empire and its local agents and reconquer sovereignty as the cornerstone of any future socialist construction.

What should be clear without a sliver of a doubt is that the “Rodrigato” – and the lumpen bourgeoisie it represents – has opted to pact with the Trump administration. Any revolutionary strategy to resist re-colonization must begin from concrete analysis of concrete conditions. Ignoring the acting Venezuelan leadership’s discourse and policies, pretending that there is a cunning secret plan being devised or trying to frame everything as a masterful 3D chess move, will ultimately hamper the most important task: fighting US imperialism.

Source: Sovereign Media

Venezuelan provisional president Delcy Rodríguez’s all-smiles photo op with Trump in a Manhattan hotel on September 22 proved too much for some of her erstwhile supporters. For the Spanish leftist Juan Carlos Monedero, a staunch defender of Hugo Chávez, Maduro and at first Rodríguez, her New York appearance “clashed with the previous socialist and anti-imperialist discourse” of her movement.

Shortly before the encounter, Rodríguez evaded a reporter’s question about whether she would visit jailed Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro in Brooklyn. Her decision to stay clear of Maduro is consistent with her attempt to chart a new course for Venezuela.

Rodríguez became interim president following the bloody U.S. military incursion on January 3, 2026 that resulted in the kidnapping of Maduro and the First Lady Cilia Flores. Facing the prospect of a second, more devastating military attack, Rodríguez shifted sharply toward Washington on foreign and oil policy while reshuffling the public administration and military at the expense of hardline pro-Chávez (Chavista) loyalists.

Rodriguez’s strategy goes too far

Rodríguez’s strategy from the outset was to demonstrate that she was not cowardly submitting to Washington’s dictates or acting as a collaborationist a la Vichy France. Her wholehearted embrace of policies pushed by Washington is designed to dispel any impression that she is bowing to U.S. pressure. On many key issues, she has become as Catholic as the Pope with regard to Trump, while retaining the Chavista label. Shortly after January 3, Rodríguez affirmed “there is no foreign agent” governing Venezuela, a claim unconvincingly echoed by the second in command Diosdado Cabello who alleged “we don’t depend on anyone.”

In a different vein, pro-Rodríguez analysts argue that the interim president has zero options given the U.S. threats. Either submit to Washington or expect massive bombardment and/or a return of the old regime.

But there is clear evidence that Rodríguez has some latitude, albeit limited, which she has declined to fully exercise. That’s because Trump is fully wedded to his partnership with her.

Trump decided to recognize Rodríguez rather than right-wing leader María Corina Machado – much to the disappointment of Miami-based anti-Communist hawks – for good reasons. A confidential CIA report requested by the Trump administration prior to January 3 warned that the Venezuelan opposition lacked support within the pro-Chavista armed forces as well as the police force. The conclusion was obvious: turning power over to Machado was a recipe for chaos, if not civil war.

Trump has assimilated the Pentagon’s assessment of “de-Baathification” following the U.S. invasion of Iraq as a “complete disaster,” responsible for the endless internecine conflict in that nation. Trump has repeatedly invoked the Iraq fiasco when discussing the Rodríguez government. At one press conference he noted with reference to Venezuela “We had, as you remember, Iraq, where everybody got fired…And you know what they turned into? ISIS. And we don’t want that.”

Moreover, the decision to recognize Rodríguez rather than Machado was not taken on a whim but rather followed months of careful deliberation at the highest level of the Trump administration. He now touts his partnership with Rodríguez as a major success at a time in which he has very few of them to tout. It is thus unlikely that Trump will readily turn his back on Rodríguez. The upshot is that Rodríguez has some room to maneuver.

How much wiggle room?

The Chavista movement under Rodríguez has retreated from its defining banner: the uncompromising defense of national sovereignty. To its credit, the movement’s leadership continues to cast itself as an opponent of the traditional elite and a defender of the collective production units known as “communes.” But these positive features fall short for a movement that once raised such high expectations. While retaining a sense of realism, Rodríguez could have at least maintained a more neutral position on issues that compromised national sovereignty.

One of the most troubling examples was Venezuela’s collaboration in the extrajudicial killing of Niño Guerrero, leader of the criminal Tren de Aragua, in a U.S. Southern Command missile strike in the state of Bolívar in June 2026. The Venezuelan government, which provided intelligence information to the Southern Command, issued a statement in which it “congratulated” all participants in the operation. In doing so, Caracas lent credence to Trump’s false narrative that drug traffickers are terrorists. At the very least, the Rodríguez government could have stayed out of the operation while maintaining a neutral public posture.

Equally striking was the marked presence of Israeli military officers, including senior army officer Brigadier General Elad Edri, at a formal farewell meeting on July 21 in which Rodríguez thanked Israel for its earthquake relief efforts. U.S. and Israeli military involvement in the recovery operations drew objections from Chavista social movements, such as the famed Caracas barrio-based Coordinadora Simón Bolívar. They especially resented the conspicuousness of the presence of military personnel of both nations, symbolized by a controversial photograph of a beaming Diosdado Cabello shaking hands with U.S. Southern Command chief Francis L. Donovan, who had overseen the January 3 incursion. This, then, was another instance in which the Chavista leadership offered Washington a level of support that went well beyond what was necessary given the circumstances.

Still another example of the lengths to which Rodríguez has gone in accommodating Washington is her willingness to accept the Pentagon’s participation in the Venezuelan oil industry. The mega oil deal reached between Washington and Caracas in late August gives the Pentagon 35 percent ownership of the operating company that is to exploit 17 Venezuelan oil fields representing nearly 150 percent of U.S. proven reserves. But there is no precedent for the Pentagon’s equity ownership of this nature which is of dubious legality. Venezuelan analyst Phil Gunson, who has been briefed on the deal, told the Guardian that the major oil companies “are concerned about the irregularities.” From Venezuela’s viewpoint, the involvement of the Pentagon in the nation’s oil business makes little sense.

From the perspective of the Pentagon and its Israeli counterpart, Rodríguez’s conciliatory stance appears to be a vindication and a reversal of Chavista defiance – if not a payback for past grievances. In January 2000 Chávez turned back a sizable relief operation that the same U.S. Southern Command was in the process of sending in response to catastrophic floods, which had devastated the state of Vargas the previous month. Chávez’s decision was an embarrassing rebuff for the Pentagon, if not humiliating.

Along similar lines, Roni Kaplan, spokesperson for the Israeli armed forces and a member of his nation’s aid mission, told CE Noticias Financieras-English on July 22, “it’s like when you fight with someone and they come to apologize, and when they say they’re sorry, you say, “‘I’ve already forgotten all about it.’” Kaplan’s statement puts in sharp relief the extent to which Rodríguez’s posture breaks with the Chavista past.

Where things now stand

The pro-Chavista think tank Misión Verdad puts a positive spin on Rodríguez’s strategy. According to its take, the Manhattan meeting with Trump marked the point at which “Washington’s asymmetric coercion and the strategic adaptation deployed by the Chavista movement converge.” For both Trump and Rodríguez, the aim was the same: “stabilization… to reduce political costs by sacrificing ideological orthodoxy.” The asymmetry according to the Misión Verdad statement “does not erase the agency of the quantitatively weaker actor; it alters its tactics, shifting it from open confrontation toward strategic adaptation.”

The adaptation demanded by the asymmetry is captured in a slogan championed by Diosdado Cabello: “Venezuela: Reborn United.” Strip away the Misión’s lofty language, and the message is that the Chavista movement needs to make a fundamental break with its past in important ways.

Adaption is understandable given the circumstances of January 3. But if Chavismo abandons the banner of defense of national sovereignty, little remains of what defined the movement. And that is precisely where the strategy of being “as Catholic as the Pope” in accommodating Washington has led.

That’s not to say there are easy answers or that an alternative strategy would necessarily succeed, particularly given Trump’s notorious unpredictability. Nor does it mean that Rodríguez deserves to be demonized as a sellout as so many on the left are doing. Such demonization underestimates the challenges and uniqueness of the situation, at the same time that it divides the solidarity movement. The relative unity of the Chavista leadership has been one of its strengths ever since Chávez’s death in 2013, and the same needs to be preserved in the solidarity movement.

The problem is that the options available to Rodríguez are scarce, whereas Trump has many. He need not pull off another January 3. Nearly all Venezuela’s oil-derived revenue is in a U.S. account handled by Marco Rubio. All Rubio has to do is to withhold it or scale it back whenever Rodríguez steps out of line with Washington.

Even with this reality hanging over her, Rodríguez and other Chavista leaders have put forward two major demands: free Maduro and Flores and an end to the sanctions, which remain largely intact. Rodríguez, however, has not put these two demands front and center in her dialogue with the Trump administration – not by a long shot.

As pressure from Miami grows for Venezuela to set an electoral timetable, the position that elections and harsh sanctions are incompatible would shift responsibility for any delay onto Washington. Last Spring, Chavista leader Ernesto Villegas, who headed the government’s Program for Peace and Democratic Coexistence, called for “elections free of sanctions.” Linking elections explicitly to the lifting of sanctions would allow the Rodríguez government to reclaim some distance from Washington, even as U.S. blackmail severely limits its ability to fully assert national sovereignty.

Steve Ellner is a retired professor of the Universidad de Oriente in Venezuela where he lived for over 40 years and is currently Associate Managing Editor of Latin American Perspectives. He is the author and editor of over a dozen books on Latin American politics and history. In 2018 he spoke in over twenty cities in the U.S. and Canada as part of a Venezuelan solidarity tour.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Venezuelanalysis editorial staff.

Source: Counterpunch

Caracas, October 6, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – The US Justice Department has urged New York District Judge Alvin Hellerstein to reject Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores’ sovereign immunity claims amid their ongoing legal case.

In a court filing submitted on October 2, prosecutors told the court that Maduro and Flores’ motions to dismiss their indictments “should be denied.”

The Venezuelan president and first lady, who is also a legislator, were kidnapped in Caracas by US forces on January 3. They were charged with drug trafficking conspiracy and weapons possession, with Maduro additionally facing a “narco-terrorism” accusation.

The pair’s defense teams filed motions to dismiss the case in September, arguing that their respective positions in the Venezuelan government should make them immune to criminal prosecution in a third country.

In response, the Justice Department stated that the recognition of a foreign head of state is the exclusive competency of the executive branch, and that Washington has not recognized Maduro since 2019. Historically, US courts have deferred to the White House and State Department on foreign policy matters.

However, in the ongoing case, Justice Department officials sought to bolster their argument by stating that the Venezuelan government, led by Acting President Delcy Rodríguez, has declined to invoke immunity for Maduro and Flores.

“If Venezuela wished to assert its view that the defendants were entitled to immunity in this, it could have,“ the submitted document read. “The defendants’ attempt to claim the contrary is an admission that such silence is devastating to their claims.”

The prosecutors pointed to an ongoing civil lawsuit in Florida against Maduro, Rodríguez, and other defendants, where the Venezuelan government, through its US embassy, requested that the Trump administration communicate to the respective court that the acting president should “enjoy absolute immunity from judicial proceedings in foreign domestic courts.”

The State Department sent a letter in June calling on the Florida district court to “promptly dismiss the proceedings.” The White House likewise communicated to the court that all claims against Rodríguez should be “dismissed without prejudice.”

In August 2025, three US nationals who were imprisoned in Venezuela sued Maduro, Rodríguez, and several other current and former state officials. The plaintiffs claimed to have suffered “torture” and to have been used in “hostage diplomacy.” The judge issued a default ruling after Maduro and other defendants failed to show and awarded $314 million in damages to the plaintiffs.

“Venezuela did not request immunity in this case, despite every opportunity to do so. Indeed, there is no doubt that the current Venezuelan government knows how to request immunity,” the Justice Department’s recent filing continued.

Prosecutors went on to claim that the Trump administration’s foreign policy views, coupled with the Venezuelan government not explicitly invoking immunity, should outweigh the defense’s assertion that the United Nations recognized Maduro’s presidency.

Hellerstein is scheduled to hear oral arguments on the pre-trial motions to dismiss on November 17 before issuing a ruling. If the trial goes forward, it will begin on June 1, 2027.

Caracas has not commented on the latest developments in Maduro and Flores’ legal case. In recent months, Venezuelan officials have occasionally expressed hope that the two will eventually return to the country but without demanding their immediate release.

Rodríguez made no mention of Maduro and Flores’ kidnapping and prosecution during her recent trip to New York for the 81st session of the UN General Assembly. In a July interview, she claimed that Maduro has the right to “demonstrate the truth” before the US Justice system but did not call for his liberation.

The Venezuelan government is covering the pair’s legal defense costs after the US Treasury Department lifted restrictions blocking it.

In his UN speech on September 22, Trump celebrated the military operation that led to the abduction of Maduro, whom he called an “outlaw dictator.” Trump and Rodríguez met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, with the Venezuelan leader thanking the US president for supporting “Venezuela’s reinsertion into multilateral spaces.”

Edited by Lucas Koerner in Philadelphia, USA.

William Serafino is a political scientist with a master’s degree in history. His research and analysis have focused on geopolitics. In this interview, he discusses Venezuela’s current relationship with the United States, including a major oil deal and what Donald Trump and Delcy Rodríguez seek to gain from it.

In New York, Venezuelan Acting President Delcy Rodríguez thanked Trump for his support and described their bilateral meeting as “historic.” Nearly nine months after the January 3 US bombing and kidnapping of President Maduro, how would you describe the current relationship between Caracas and Washington? Which elements are short-term Trump gimmicks, and which ones will structurally define the relationship in the future?

It is difficult to find a precise definition. Many speak of a protectorate-like condition; some even go so far as to describe it as a relationship of colonial or neocolonial subjugation. Others, however, define it as a process of political, economic, and energy normalization in which the Venezuelan acting government makes tactical concessions, but without formally compromising national sovereignty. I believe the devil is in the details, not in one-size-fits-all approaches. At the level of inter-state relations, what I observe is a strategic attachment of Venezuela to the US sphere of influence and an energy realignment that operates with significant geopolitical restrictions in what concerns relations with Russia, China, and Iran.

At the governmental level, an asymmetrical alliance (favorable to Trump) has been forged in the wake of the military defeat on January 3, from which Caracas and Washington derive immediate and existential gains: Trump cherishes the sole geopolitical achievement of his second term, and Rodríguez gains relief and fresh revenue to govern after more than a decade of suffocating sanctions, within a framework defined by US interests. This reality can hardly be classified as a protectorate, in which a foreign power takes control of diplomacy, defense, and other strategic elements of the subordinate state. Could one speak of a sui generis, or “soft,” protectorate? Perhaps, but that would be an acknowledgment that the concept is not entirely effective in explaining the situation. 

The same is true of the thesis of a “retreat with full sovereignty,” which is difficult to sustain when the US is clearly shaping the portrayal of the new national political dynamic and controlling the country’s oil revenues. That is why I have ventured –at the risk of being wrong –to speak of “joint governance” or “co-government,” in which Washington and Caracas divide areas of responsibility and share the political costs of each move so that the alliance endures and each party can, albeit unequally, reap its corresponding share of the benefits.

Trump, despite his constant demeaning tone, needs the Rodríguez administration to be strong enough to lead the country in order to get what he wants; only under such conditions can he extract the oil. And she, too, needs Trump to remain in power so that the oil agreement and other commitments can move forward in the medium term. This is the only way to stay in power and hope to gain legitimacy through performance. I believe that, described in this way, we are talking neither of classic colonialism nor of uncompromised sovereignty, but of something more unique that requires developing other analytical categories.

In your articles, you have pointed out that the US-Venezuela oil deal must be analyzed beyond the announced figures. What do you consider to be the true political and geopolitical scope of this agreement, and what benefits do the various actors seek to extract from it?

I see it more as a political arrangement than a formal agreement. Its function is not legal or institutional, but political. The announcement gave Trump narrative ammunition to promise that gas prices will drop, a necessity driven by his debacle in Iran. By not having signed anything, he avoids going through Congress, sends a message to his core electorate that he is guaranteeing the country’s energy security, and reassures energy corporations to go ahead and invest in Venezuela because the relationship with Caracas is solid and unshakable. Rodríguez, on the other hand, benefits from the fact that the agreement shuts the door on María Corina Machado in Washington’s power circles and thereby helps reestablish her domestic legitimacy, promising a secure path to economic and social recovery underpinned by US investment.

I would go as far as saying that the agreement is Rodríguez’s trump card in a potential presidential campaign, where she will be able to present herself as the only political actor capable of boosting the economy, as opposed to potential rivals who lack influence in the White House and do not have a reliable plan to pull the country out of the spiral of inflation and economic frustration in which it finds itself after years of sanctions. 

Both sides stand to gain politically, and the agreement appears to be designed to avoid institutional resistance: neither is forced to face the hassle of legislative approval nor the criticism from political opponents. Since there are no specific clauses, they can more easily divert attention and focus their message on the eventual economic benefits. This level of coordination is a sign of partnership, not of one-sided imposition. If that were the case, Trump could force Rodríguez to sign a bilateral treaty in the National Assembly, and that is not what we are seeing.

You have paid special attention to the role of the Pentagon and the involvement of its Office of Strategic Capital in the structure of the agreement. Why is it so significant that the US defense establishment is a formal actor in a Venezuelan oil deal?

It seems to me that the Pentagon’s involvement serves as a coercive cover—an insurance policy backed by force—to ensure, in the medium and long term, US commercial and financial advantages in the exploitation of the oil fields included in the agreement. Let us imagine that the current government, or another one in the future, wants to modify the arrangement and secure better terms. At that point, it would not be dealing with a conventional transnational corporation, but with one controlled by the Department of War. It doesn’t take much thought to realize that negotiating under such conditions would scare anyone off: the language of business would be replaced by the language of weapons, and after January 3, no one would want to venture into this murky territory.

Furthermore, I believe that the Pentagon’s involvement sends a message to companies to invest and feel secure in the knowledge that the Department of War guarantees their investments and capital commitments in the Venezuelan energy sector. For the US, Venezuela’s oil reserves are not being treated as an economic asset, but rather as a matter of “national security.” As we well know, when that term is used, any coercive tool is fair game against a country’s sovereignty.

You have argued that the relationship between Caracas and Washington is taking on the characteristics of a negotiation marked by a profound power asymmetry. And many official spokespeople or analysts ask, “But what alternative do we have?” whenever criticism is raised about the path the government has chosen. What real ability does Venezuela have today to negotiate different terms or reject certain demands from the United States?

Right now, those capabilities are very limited, because, as I said, it’s not just a matter of US impositions, but also of calculating how to obtain tangible benefits from an asymmetrical relationship. But politics also takes place outside institutional spaces, and I believe there is much to be done there. What I’m about to say won’t, I don’t think, resolve the dilemma you’ve raised, but it could be a path toward regaining political vitality and initiative: strengthening social consensus on national sovereignty, refusing to concede the battle for historical memory regarding a century-long history of US plunder, and fostering a broad discussion on the vision for the nation’s future. These steps could help break the inertia somewhat and prepare the country for more favorable political conditions in the near future. In contrast, suggesting specific policies or positions to the current government would be irresponsible, because I’m not the one who has to deal with a Trump and his violent ego.

My message is directed at all of us who do not hold such high-stakes positions and can contribute, from our own small spheres of influence or through our individual activism, to rebuilding a patriotic consciousness that must adapt to a new reality. How many open forums are being promoted to discuss the educational model, the economic model, and the model of income distribution? Which bodies are evaluating the trajectory of the bilateral relationship with the US in order to better address it? Are these discussions conceptually limited? Perhaps these debates will not change the current situation of Trump’s disproportionate influence, but they would give us autonomy in our vision and in shaping the future. If Venezuela does not have its own vision on major national issues, there is a risk that they will end up being imposed from Washington. That would be committing the perfect crime, and I believe we must avoid it: with national unity, transcending political divisions.

In your articles and social media posts, you have criticized political elites who, historically, have lacked “imagination” beyond offering lucrative deals to the US. How did Chávez manage to break that mold? How could Venezuela return to a more sovereign path?

To be fair, Chávez broke the mold but the political and geopolitical conditions were ripe for it. The weakness of the national elites, discredited by a society weary of inequality and injustice, coincided with the US being drunk on power at the end of the Cold War. In its plans to establish itself as a unipolar superpower, Latin America did not figure as the central battleground. The inattention of an empire more concerned with reshaping West Asia, forcing China into the “rules-based order,” and eliminating the last strongholds of the socialist bloc (Tito’s Yugoslavia) in turn allowed Chávez to implement his agenda without facing a full-scale war, although he did face numerous coup attempts. 

The present conditions are different. There is a hemispheric imperial retreat underpinned by a militarized reinterpretation of the Monroe Doctrine, which drastically raises the cost of sovereignty-oriented proposals. Still, I believe that what is most commendable about Chávez, and which can be of use in this new context, is his ability to clearly identify favorable conditions and act upon them.

I believe that anyone who considers themselves a political figure must build upon these principles to take on the new challenges of the present, developing and defending a dignified vision of the nation’s future. I believe that, rather than waiting for another Chávez to emerge, we should instead study his thought in depth and draw on the best of it to renew political practices, always interpreting the situation for what it is: changing, volatile, and full of opportunities. Chávez is a great political school, but it has been reduced to a crude tool for private interests of all kinds.