MADURO GAINS GROUND
As Brazil and Colombia retreat from exerting pressure, a weakened dictatorship improves its chances of survival
Edmundo Gonzalez, by all accounts the landslide winner of Venezuela’s July 28 presidential election, fled the country for Spain last weekend after the regime of President Nicolas Maduro had issued a warrant for his arrest. It was part of an exodus of opposition participants in the elections, including organizers and precinct observers who collected and published thousands of precinct vote tallies proving Gonzalez had defeated Maduro by a 2-1 margin. The regime has been hunting them down in a door-to-door operation that has led to the arbitrary arrest or disappearance of nearly 2,000 people since Maduro declared himself the winner without publishing detailed results. Yesterday, the United States imposed sanctions on 16 officials of the Maduro regime it says have been responsible for obstructing the democratic process in Venezuela and violating the human rights of opposition figures and poll workers. They include the head of Venezuela's Supreme Court, state security force leaders and prosecutors participating in the post-election crackdown.
What is underneath?
The exiling of Gonzalez to Spain marked the definitive failure of the efforts of Brazilian President Lula da Silva and Colombian President Gustavo Petro to leverage their strategic friendship with Maduro to defend even a fig leaf of democracy in Venezuela. Every wan attempt by Lula and his aging foreign policy advisor, Celso Amorim, to give Maduro third, fourth, fifth and sixth chances to show the slightest hint of respect towards their effort has ended in humiliating failure.
Amorim himself was the most prominent foreign observer of the July 28 election, with the warm welcome of the Maduro regime and the good faith of the opposition. As the regime’s interventions began on the night of the vote counting, Amorim was as collegial and politically correct as possible in reacting to the blatant fraud unfolding before everyone’s eyes. He left the country rather than be put in the position of telling the unvarnished truth on chavista soil.
The Brazilian and Colombian governments publicly called on the regime to publish the complete vote tallies from all precincts to substantiate Maduro’s alleged win. To date, there have been no such results published. A top lackey of the regime, National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez, called Amorim out in response to a rubber-stamp court ruling that upheld the unsubstantiated “win” by Maduro on August 22: “Are you listening, Mr. Celso Amorim?”, he quipped sarcastically.
When the regime formally issued its arrest warrant for Gonzalez on September 3, Amorim was bolder: “It would be a political arrest, and we do not accept political imprisonment,” he told Reuters. “There is no denying that there is an authoritarian escalation in Venezuela. We do not feel openness to dialogue.”
Colombia joined Brazil in issuing a joint statement expressing “profound concern” over the arrest order but it had no effect. More poll workers being hunted by the regime are showing up in Colombian border towns after having escaped. Gonzalez was welcomed to Spain by leftist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who expressed solidarity with him as “a person who unfortunately suffers persecution and repression” but refused to acknowledge either his or Maduro’s victory in the election.
The next developments inside Venezuela seem likely to raise the pressure on Lula and Petro as Maduro continues to test how far he can go without meaningful pushback from them. Six aides to opposition leader Maria Corina Machado have been hiding from the regime’s goon squads inside the Argentine ambassador’s residence in Caracas for months, where the government of President Javier Milei granted them asylum.
Maduro severed relations with Argentina shortly after the election and expelled its ambassador, with Brazil assuming protective responsibilities over Argentina’s embassy and diplomatic residence.
The Maduro regime has since declared that Brazil is no longer authorized to represent Argentine interests in the country and is positioning its security services to storm the residence and drag the dissidents away. Machado remains in hiding, and this week pledged to remain in Venezuela to “take part in the struggle here” while Gonzalez “does it from abroad.” In a call with U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Ben Cardin (D-MD) and a bipartisan group of his Senate colleagues, she urged the U.S. to continue backing the opposition as it carries out new protests in Venezuela. Also facing a long-standing arrest warrant, it is unclear how long Machado will be safe in hiding.
Our take:
The humiliation of Lula and Petro in the twilight of their political careers should be seen as the last straw for any more policies of “strategic patience” with regards to the chavista regime. It has been easy to blame the U.S., or imperialism, or decades-old (and irrelevant) moves by long-extinct military dictatorships in the region for the suffering of the Venezuelan people while they and the rest of the leftist old guard have habitually coddled and protected Maduro all this time. Either by inertia or design, the United States finally lobbed the hot potato into their laps and they saw for themselves how cold-blooded dictators are nobody’s friend no matter how much you flatter them.
But Maduro is undoubtedly in a weaker position than he’s ever been. He is more vulnerable now than when he usurped the 2018 election and faced the Trump Administration’s policy of “maximum pressure” and had hostile conservative governments in Brazil and Colombia arrayed against him. Humiliated allies are more dangerous in the long run. They may pull punches in the immediate, but Maduro can’t count on them to be in on his short-term escape plans like he has for so long. They are like spent munitions in a war of survival.
The weakness is showing. Carolina Jimenez Sandoval of the respected Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) told the New York Times last month that while she’s “seen patterns of repression before” in Venezuela, “I don't think I have ever seen this ferocity.” To look at Venezuela today and the political darkness that has descended over it, it’s amazing to think a somewhat free and fair election took place less than two months ago. It is, of course, unlikely the regime will ever allow such a thing to happen again unless it resembles the old Eastern European Communist variety with one set of ruling party candidates and 99% victory margins.
Maduro has also peeled away the artifice of Latin America’s coddling of the Cuban dictatorship for over 60 years, which has routinely practiced worse levels of repression and state-run violence against democracy advocates than what is being so widely condemned in Venezuela today. The hypocrisy is magnified in the kinds of public attacks over social media like from Nicaraguan dictator Daniel Ortega, a staunch Maduro ally, against Lula and Petro for insufficient leftist toadyism: “Petro, what can I say to Petro? Poor Petro, poor Petro. I see Petro competing with Lula to see who will be the leader representing the yanquis in Latin America.”
Lula this week pronounced himself opposed to U.S. sanctions against Venezuela, which he calls “blockades”, a buzz word of the pro-Cuban crowd he still counts himself among. But Maduro will persist in power no matter how violent he becomes so long as he has Russia and China as economic release valves against U.S. and European pressure, and so long as Brazil and Colombia do nothing to meaningfully pressure him either in public or behind the scenes.
I don’t see Lula and Petro risking a centavo of political capital to exercise real and consequential pressure on Maduro unless they can guarantee an outcome that will lionize them as global heroes and yield a big return on their investment. It’s a chicken and egg situation. In strategic concert and with no cracks in their resolve, they can pressure Maduro in ways that could threaten his grip on power. All the available evidence points to a firm decision not to go that route.
Both leaders seem content with simply tailoring their responses to temper any new outflow of thousands of refugees to join the millions of Venezuelans who have already fled across their borders. That also might not work. In the meantime, a weakened Maduro is emboldened to feel out where the line is going to be drawn on his behavior, and adapt his survival strategies to that reality. Despite his unprecedented vulnerability, Maduro seems on track to stay in place as a result.
What We’re Watching:
As expected, Mexico’s Congress adopted the judicial reform package of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, which included the popular election of over 1,600 judges and magistrates and raised concerns among investors about the consistency and predictability of legal rulings. Other reforms may put in doubt Mexico’s commitments under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) which is scheduled to go under review in 2026. Potential changes to regulatory agencies critical to upholding USMCA standards could lead to noncompliance issues and trade disputes that could threaten Mexico’s economic stability.
Note to Readers:
I will be on vacation next week so I won’t be publishing an edition on September 20. Take good care, and I’m sure there will be plenty for us to recap on September 27! -KI