Nicolás Maduro was an utter disaster as the leader of Venezuela — corrupt, incompetent, illegitimate and criminal. He is a bad person. The problems he and his equally awful predecessor and mentor, Hugo Chávez, created in Venezuela led to an increase in drug and human trafficking and a wide variety of other organized criminal activities that destabilized numerous countries in Latin America and beyond. His policies led to the collapse of Venezuela’s economy and to the chaotic migration of over 8 million people, who fled the country in desperation. These problems impact our country in ways with which we are all too familiar — increased criminal activity due to the increase in the size and power of drug cartels, and a surge of migrants we have struggled to accommodate, to name just two.
But President Donald Trump’s approach to Maduro, Venezuela, the Western Hemisphere and geopolitics in general is dangerous and wrong. It creates a whole other set of problems for peace, prosperity and security for our country and the world, while having little chance of changing the governance of Venezuela in a way that will actually address the problems outlined above. Both of these things can be true. Both of these things are true. We must move past the simplistic idea that any criticism of Trump’s policies in Venezuela means sympathy for Maduro and the Chavismo movement he once led. It does not.
Western imperialism and the exploitation of resources in Latin America for the benefit of Western companies and at the expense of the overwhelming majority of the people in Latin America led directly to the rise of extreme left movements led by people like Chávez and Fidel Castro. Their policies never produced anything positive for their people, but their opposition to foreign exploitation met sympathetic ears throughout the region. Who can forget that Chávez basically called former President George W. Bush Satan incarnate at the United Nations in 2003? The majority of his people loved Chávez for that, even as he had his government take over private industry and property, run them into the ground, and suck up any money that was left for his corrupt political cronies.
Now, President Trump is bringing America back to Venezuela by saying that the United States “runs” the country and that he will demand that Venezuela give us the oil on their land that Trump says they “stole” from the U.S. What conceivable set of future leaders in Venezuela could possibly gain the trust of their people by aligning with Trump and his view of the situation? Many Venezuelans are happy Maduro is gone. The majority probably can swallow the United States military action that blatantly violated their sovereignty because of the outcome. But how many can accept the United States running their country and acting like the oil beneath their land belongs to us?
This gets more problematic when you consider that the U.S. military operation that removed Maduro and his wife left the rest of Maduro’s government intact. Trump has dismissed the most popular opposition leader, Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado, as not suitable to lead the country. He’s given no indication that he intends to honor the legitimate outcome of the election Maduro stole in 2024, which was clearly won by Edmundo González. Trump’s plan, as somewhat explained by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, involves allowing Maduro’s Vice President Delcy Rodríguez to remain in power. Rubio acknowledges that she and the rest of the team that remains in power are no better than Maduro. Still, he claims that our blockade of their oil, and the threat of removal of Rodríguez and anyone else who gets in our way in the same way the administration dispatched Maduro, will make the Rodríguez government more compliant with our demands.
What are those demands? Thus far, the only one clearly articulated is that they give us their oil, which they are apparently about to do since the administration has blocked them from selling it any other way. This doesn’t change much, however. Maduro’s government remains in power, and Venezuela’s economic condition stays about the same, with the only small difference being that instead of China controlling the sale of Venezuela’s modest oil output, the United States will.
Focusing obsessively on the oil overlooks the two much bigger challenges that Venezuela now faces and that the United States must confront, given our involvement. First is stopping a post-Maduro leadership vacuum/battle from leading to chaos, similar to what happened in Libya post-Moammar Gadhafi. Second is reducing the power of what remains of the Maduro regime and easing toward a transition to a more legitimate government that can begin the long and difficult process of rebuilding Venezuela’s governing structure and economy.
Neither will be easy. Move too fast on the transition, and chaos becomes more likely. Move too slow and the entrenched problematic powers remain in place. Remember the enthusiasm when the Taliban fell? Saddam Hussein? Gadhafi? That’s the easy part. Bulwarks of civil society in Venezuela — the bureaucracy, the courts, the education system and more — have been gutted, making the transition there even harder. Trump’s undermining of the legitimate opposition, acting like a new age imperialist, and obsessing about taking back “our” oil from Venezuela, makes it harder still.
If the process bogs down, then what? Trump says he’s not afraid of “boots on the ground” — meaning U.S. troops in Venezuela. He’s muttered a few times about us needing to “rebuild” that country. He wants U.S. oil companies back doing business there, but that will require massive spending on infrastructure and security. Who is going to pay for that?
Remember, Trump promised on the campaign trail to keep us out of foreign wars, nation-building and regime change operations. But now that he’s in office, he seems hellbent on diving into exactly those things while neglecting critical needs here at home around health care, affordability, infrastructure and countless other issues.
Trump started his attacks around Venezuela by claiming it needed to be done to address the drug crisis in our country and the growing power of drug cartels. But the drug crisis in America is primarily driven by demand. Deaths of despair in far too many cases drive our overdose epidemic. People lack opportunity, see no future and turn to drugs to alter their reality. Instead of investing in our country to address this problem, Trump is off pulling us into another foreign conflict with an uncertain future. Also, remember that it is an increase in fentanyl abuse causing most of the substance abuse problems and almost all of the overdose deaths here at home. Venezuela has nothing to do with fentanyl.
We also cannot look at Trump’s actions in Venezuela outside the context of the threats he has made against Colombia, Cuba, Panama, Greenland and Canada, and his larger claim that the United States must “dominate” the Western Hemisphere. These threats create numerous problems, three of which stand out.
First, they put the United States on the path of returning to imperialism in Latin America, where the U.S. would control as much territory as possible, exploit the people and extract resources for the benefit of our corporations. Mass migration and criminal activity like drug smuggling and human trafficking will be much harder to contain if hundreds of millions of people in Latin America stay trapped in poverty. We need to work with partners in Latin America to help build a better future for all people there, not just the powerful and privileged few.
Second, imperialism and wealth concentration will only increase the influence of Russia, China, Iran and the radical ideologies pushed by Castro and Chávez. Their power and influence derive from our failures. Out of desperation, the people of Latin America will look for any alternative that they can find.
Third, Trump’s approach destroys the rule of law, sovereignty and any claim the U.S. has to legitimacy in the world, not just in Latin America. Trump’s might-makes-right worldview will create more conflict as nations and other groups see the exercise of raw, violent power as necessary to protect themselves and advance their interests.
Yes, Nicolás Maduro is a bad person. But we cannot let Trump hide behind that reality as he leads us down a very dangerous path.
