DECODING: Venezuela After Maduro — Delcy Rodriguez Between Washington and Internal Chaos

Introduction: The Night of January 3, 2026 That Changed Everything

An American military operation in the heart of Caracas

At approximately two o'clock in the morning on January 3, 2026, members of Operation Absolute Resolve — American special forces from Delta Force — burst into the residence of Nicolás Maduro in Caracas. Within minutes, the Venezuelan president and his wife Cilia Flores had been neutralized, placed aboard a helicopter, then transferred to the USS Iwo Jima waiting offshore. Final destination: New York, to be handed over to the American federal justice system. Twenty-five years of confrontation between Washington and Caracas had just ended in a single night.

The charges against Maduro: narco-terrorist conspiracy, illegal importation of cocaine into the United States, and weapons possession. The American prosecutor's office had been accumulating these charges since 2020. The political opportunity — combined with a Trump administration at the start of its second term — provided the pretext and the will to act. What had seemed unthinkable the day before was accomplished before dawn. Venezuela would never be the same.

Who is Delcy Rodriguez, heiress of power by default

In the hours following the arrest, the Venezuelan Supreme Court — entirely composed of judges loyal to Chavismo — ordered former Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, 56, to assume power as interim president. She was formally sworn in on January 5, 2026, administered the oath by her own brother, Jorge Rodriguez, president of the National Assembly. A transfer of power within the family, in a country where formal institutions have for years served as backdrop to real power.

Delcy Rodriguez is one of the most experienced figures in the Chavist system. Former foreign minister, former president of the constituent assembly, vice president since 2018: she knows the levers of Venezuelan power like no one else. What was less clear, on the evening of January 3, is whether she had the will — and above all the capacity — to transform this inherited power into genuine governance, in a devastated country, surrounded by internal enemies, and under the gaze of a Washington that had just sent an unambiguous signal.

Operation Absolute Resolve: Anatomy of an American Show of Force

A decision that had been in preparation for years

The arrest of Maduro was not an improvisation. The American federal investigations into his ties with the FARC cartel and with international cocaine trafficking dated back to 2020 for the first indictments. In 2024, new evidence — seized encrypted communications, testimony from informants inside the regime — had strengthened the case. It was not Trump who invented the charges. He chose to execute them physically rather than continue to brandish them as a diplomatic threat.

The operational logistics involved coordination between the United States Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), the CIA, and Venezuelan informants within Maduro's inner circle. The precise access to the presidential residence in Caracas, at two in the morning, without triggering the alert of the security forces posted there, strongly suggests that part of Maduro's entourage had signaled the operation in advance — or had been neutralized beforehand. The precise operational details remain classified.

The charges, the transfer, detention in Brooklyn

Maduro and Cilia Flores were presented before a New York federal judge on January 6, 2026. Maduro pleaded not guilty. His lawyer immediately challenged the legality of his arrest — an extraterritorial seizure without formal extradition, on the sovereign territory of a third state. These legal arguments, though sound in terms of international law, ran into a precedent the United States had carefully built since the arrest of Manuel Noriega in Panama in 1989.

Maduro is currently held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, awaiting his trial for drug trafficking. He faces a potential sentence of several decades in prison. His trial had not yet been scheduled at the time of writing this article. Meanwhile, Cilia Flores was released on bail under strict conditions, after several weeks of detention. The Venezuela they governed for years no longer exists in the same form.

Delcy Rodriguez: From Symbolic Resistance to Pragmatic Cooperation

The first reflex: indignation, then the pivot

In the first hours following Maduro's arrest, Delcy Rodriguez followed the usual Chavist script. She qualified the American operation as a "kidnapping," demanded the immediate return of the legitimate president, denounced Yankee imperialism. These declarations were expected — without them, she lost all legitimacy with the Chavist base. But simultaneously, according to information published by The Guardian on January 22, 2026, she had in fact already signaled her willingness to cooperate with Washington before the formalization of her inauguration.

This double game — public indignation, private pragmatism — perfectly summarizes Rodriguez's position since January 2026. She must maintain the ideological facade to preserve the cohesion of the Chavist apparatus she needs to govern. But she has perfectly understood that Venezuela's economic future — and her own survival in power — depends on normalizing relations with the United States. She is a political acrobat on a tightrope above a precipice.

The concrete signals sent to Washington

Within a few weeks, Rodriguez sent several tangible signals to Washington. She reopened Venezuela to foreign private investment in the oil sector, reversing nationalization decisions from the Maduro era. She freed 621 political prisoners, a concrete measure that responded to a longstanding American demand. An amnesty law was passed on February 19, 2026, covering some political opponents and allowing the return of some exiles.

On April 1, 2026, the United States lifted personal sanctions on Delcy Rodriguez — an implicit recognition of her legitimacy as an interlocutor. On March 12, 2026, Washington had already officially recognized her as Venezuela's sole head of state. In less than one hundred days, a woman the United States had sanctioned for her ties to the Maduro regime had become their official dialogue partner. This is the speed at which policy can reverse when strategic interests demand it.

The Legal Question: A Constitutional Void Dressed Up as Legality

The concept of "forced absence" — nowhere in the constitution

The Venezuelan Supreme Court qualified the situation as the president's "forced absence" to justify the transfer of power to Rodriguez. The problem: this concept does not exist in the 1999 Venezuelan constitution. The constitution provides for resignation, death, permanent physical or mental incapacity, and abandonment of functions. It does not provide for the case of a president arrested by foreign forces and held in Brooklyn.

This constitutional void was filled by the Supreme Court through an extensive interpretation — some jurists would say a tortured one. The interim term is used, but without a fixed duration. Rodriguez governs without her own electoral mandate, without a clear time limit, within a fragile legal framework that her political adversaries could challenge at any moment. This legal fragility is both a constraint and a tool: it gives her a reason not to organize elections too quickly, while rendering her vulnerable if her coalition fractures.

Diosdado Cabello: the main internal threat

Diosdado Cabello, a historic figure of Chavismo, former president of the National Assembly, a man reputed to control a significant part of the military apparatus and intelligence services, is Rodriguez's main internal rival. He represents the hard-line wing of the movement — the one that refuses any cooperation with Washington, that has the most to lose from normalization, and that has the networks to organize resistance.

In the weeks following Rodriguez's inauguration, personnel movements within the DGCIM — the military counterintelligence directorate — were observed by analysts. Rodriguez appointed a loyal chief to monitor Cabello. This is Venezuelan politics in all its opacity: power struggles playing out in intelligence appointments, not in public declarations. Rodriguez knows that her survival depends as much on managing her potentially treacherous allies as on managing her declared enemies.

The Venezuelan Economy: The Urgency That Overrides Everything

A country bled dry after twenty years of Bolivarian economics

Venezuela in January 2026 is an economically devastated country. After twenty years of Bolivarian revolution, the forced nationalizations, mismanagement of the oil sector, endemic corruption, and American sanctions have produced a shattered economy. GDP per capita fell by more than 75% between 2014 and 2024. More than 7 million Venezuelans have emigrated, primarily to Colombia, the United States, Spain, and other Latin American countries. This is one of the largest migration crises in the recent history of the Americas.

The oil sector — supposed to be the engine of national prosperity — produces approximately 700,000 barrels per day in 2026, compared to more than 3 million in the early 2000s. The oil infrastructure is aging, under-maintained, and largely incapable of rapidly recovering its historical capacity without massive investment. Rodriguez knows that reopening Venezuela to foreign investors in oil is not an ideological question. It is a question of national survival.

The first economic reforms: pragmatism under pressure

Under Rodriguez, several significant economic reforms have been launched. Oil contracts have been signed with international companies — notably with advanced discussions with American and European majors. Restrictions on US dollar transactions have been relaxed, allowing a wider de facto dollarization of the formal economy. Special economic zones have been decreed to attract non-oil industries.

These reforms are real but fragile. They depend on a political stability that nothing guarantees. They encounter resistance within the Chavist apparatus, which sees them as ideological betrayal. And they run up against decades of distrust from the international business community toward Venezuela. Rebuilding investor confidence after twenty years of forced nationalizations and expropriations does not happen in a few months — even with the best intentions.

The Venezuelan Diaspora and the Impossible Return

Seven million exiles watching from outside

The 7 million Venezuelans in exile represent a considerable political, economic, and symbolic force. Many have relatives still in the country. Many send financial remittances that constitute a significant portion of income for some Venezuelan families. And many are following with intense attention the political developments since January 2026, asking themselves whether the moment to return has finally arrived.

The amnesty law of February 19, 2026 allowed some exiled opponents to return. But distrust runs deep. The Chavist system has not been dismantled — it has adapted. The same social control structures, the same military and intelligence networks, the same bureaucracy colored in Bolivarian red are in place. A political opponent who returns is not necessarily safe simply because Rodriguez signed an amnesty law. The reality on the ground can differ considerably from official policy.

The Venezuelan opposition: fragmented, distrustful, without unity

The historic Venezuelan opposition — represented notably by María Corina Machado and other figures of the anti-Chavist resistance — has no unified position on Rodriguez. Some see in her pragmatism a real opportunity for transition toward something more democratic. Others perceive her as a continuation of the regime in more presentable clothes — a facade to save Chavismo by abandoning its most blatant excesses while preserving its fundamental power structures.

This division within the opposition complicates Venezuelan political life. Without a united opposition capable of formulating a credible alternative, Rodriguez can govern by default, without organized political pressure. Elections — for which no one is yet setting a date — would be necessary to give democratic legitimacy to the current situation. But organizing fair elections in a country where institutions have for two decades served only one political camp remains a considerable challenge.

American Policy in Venezuela: Tactical Victory, Strategic Uncertainty

Trump got Maduro. What does he do with Venezuela now?

Maduro's arrest is undeniably a political victory for Trump. He accomplished what several previous administrations had not dared or managed to do. He showed that the United States can directly strike a leader it considers a criminal, even on his own soil. This is a powerful signal sent to other regimes that Washington is watching.

But the question that now arises is harder: what is the American policy for post-Maduro? Recognizing Rodriguez, lifting her sanctions, supporting her economic reforms — that is what Washington has done in the first months. But deep engagement in Venezuela's reconstruction requires resources, patience, and a long-term vision that the Trump administration may not necessarily want to invest in a complex South American country when other priorities — China, Ukraine, the Middle East — are consuming attention.

The Noriega precedent and its unlearned lessons

The 1989 invasion of Panama to arrest Manuel Noriega is the most often cited precedent. Noriega was arrested, convicted, imprisoned. Panama then experienced a successful democratic transition — with ups and downs, but an overall positive trajectory. Washington sees it as a model for Venezuela. The comparison has its limits: Venezuela is much larger, much more complex, much more deeply damaged by two decades of Bolivarian governance. The Panama of 1989 did not have seven million exiles and an economy reduced to a quarter of its capacity.

American policymakers who look at Panama as a success model also forget what was particular about Panama: an already relatively diversified economy, a strong commercial tradition, and a geographical and cultural proximity to the United States that facilitated re-engagement. Venezuela is different in almost every one of these respects. Copying the model without adapting the strategy risks reproducing the failures rather than the successes.

Civil Liberties and Human Rights Under Rodriguez

The release of political prisoners: a real but insufficient gesture

The release of 621 political prisoners in the first weeks of the Rodriguez government is a concrete and positive fact. These men and women — journalists, activists, opponents, union members — had been imprisoned under Maduro for exercising fundamental rights. Their release represents a real change in the lives of hundreds of Venezuelan families.

But human rights defense organizations — Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the IACHR (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights) — maintain their vigilance. The release of known and documented political prisoners does not mean that new arbitrary arrests have ceased. Reports of undocumented detentions continue to arrive from inside the country. The repressive apparatus has not been dismantled — it released certain prisoners under external pressure while maintaining its operational capacity.

The Venezuelan press: between timid renaissance and persistent self-censorship

A few independent media outlets have attempted to resume more visible activity since January 2026. Journalists in exile are considering returning. But the Venezuelan media landscape remains deeply marked by years of censorship and intimidation. Self-censorship is often more effective than direct censorship — it settles into reflexes, in internalized red lines, in the fear of crossing a boundary whose contours remain blurry.

Rodriguez has not announced a press freedom law. She has not dismantled the legal framework used under Maduro to prosecute journalists. Her government continues to control the main Venezuelan public television channel. The change is real but limited: more is tolerated than before, but tolerance is a discretionary policy, not a guaranteed right. And a discretionary policy can be withdrawn as quietly as it was granted.

The Regional Dimension: Latin America Confronting the Venezuelan Precedent

Cuba and Nicaragua: nervousness in allied capitals

The American operation in Venezuela sent shockwaves through the other countries governed by regimes aligned with Chavismo or similar currents. In Havana, the Cuban government — already weakened by internal economic and social crises — publicly condemned Maduro's arrest while discreetly monitoring Washington's reactions. In Managua, the Ortega-Murillo government did the same: official condemnation, operational caution.

These governments know that if Washington decided to physically apply its indictments against foreign heads of state, they are potentially vulnerable. Daniel Ortega is himself the subject of American accusations related to human rights violations and trafficking. The era when an American indictment remained a theoretical threat without operational consequences may be over. That is not a certainty — but it is a possibility these regimes can no longer ignore.

Colombia and Brazil: a complicated regional diplomacy

Gustavo Petro's Colombia and Lula's Brazil adopted nuanced positions. Neither approved the American operation on principle — that would have been incompatible with their sovereignist positioning. But neither pushed for a direct confrontation with Washington. The relationship with Venezuela is too economically important — especially for Colombia, which shares a porous border and is directly impacted by the Venezuelan migration crisis.

The situation in Venezuela directly affects these two countries. Colombia hosts more than 2.5 million Venezuelan refugees. Brazil hosts several hundred thousand. A stabilization of Venezuela under Rodriguez that allowed the return of some refugees would serve the interests of Bogotá and Brasília, regardless of their reservations about the American method. Regional geopolitics is never purely ideological — practical interests always end up prevailing.

The Role of China and Russia in the Post-Maduro Era

Two major creditors facing a new reality

China and Russia both had considerable investments and receivables in Venezuela under Maduro. China had lent more than 60 billion dollars to Venezuela in exchange for oil, within the framework of its characteristic "loans for oil" agreements in Latin America. Russia had significant oil and military contracts, notably through Rosneft and arms sales.

The arrival of Rodriguez and normalization with Washington considerably complicate the position of these two actors. Moscow formally protested Maduro's arrest — this was politically obligatory. But its capacity to influence the Venezuelan situation is limited by its own economic situation under sanctions since 2022. Russia cannot "save" Venezuela financially. Beijing is more cautious: it has its receivables to protect and generally prefers adapting its relations to new political realities rather than maintaining costly ideological positions.

Venezuela as a theater of geopolitical competition

Venezuela represents a theater of geopolitical competition between Washington on one side, and Beijing and Moscow on the other. If Rodriguez succeeds in normalizing her relations with the United States, attracting Western investments in oil, and stabilizing the economy, China and Russia lose a strategic foothold in South America. This is a piece of the larger global game: every country that tilts into the American orbit is a country leaving the Sino-Russian orbit, and vice versa.

China, in particular, will watch very closely how the situation evolves in Venezuela. It has direct economic interests to preserve — its receivables, its oil contracts. It will observe whether Rodriguez honors Maduro-era contractual commitments to Beijing, which will be an important test of her capacity to navigate between American pressures and her obligations toward her Asian creditors. This is a delicate balance that admits no gross error.

The Electoral Question: When and How to Organize Credible Elections

Legitimacy through the ballot box — necessary but dangerous for Rodriguez

For the Rodriguez government to acquire genuine democratic legitimacy, elections are indispensable. Without a direct popular mandate, she remains an interim president whose power rests on a judicial decision by a Supreme Court appointed by Maduro. This fragile foundation makes her politically and diplomatically vulnerable. Even her international partners, Washington included, know that lasting normalization requires electoral legitimacy.

But credible elections in Venezuela imply several conditions that Rodriguez has not yet satisfied: an independent electoral commission, an auditable electoral register, equal media access for all candidates, international observers with full access. These conditions are known to everyone. Putting them in place requires dismantling parts of the system that Rodriguez inherited and still depends on to govern. This is the fundamental contradiction of her position.

The specter of the 2024 election and its painful memory

The Venezuelan presidential election of July 2024 was massively fraudulent, according to the conclusions of most international observers. Maduro declared his victory despite overwhelming evidence indicating a victory for opposition candidate Edmundo González. This fraud in real time provoked a bloody repression of demonstrators and a new wave of exile.

This memory is present in all conversations about the next election in Venezuela. Venezuelans who saw their vote stolen in 2024 have no reason to automatically trust a new process organized by the same institutions. Rodriguez must demonstrate — concretely, with verifiable acts — that conditions have changed. Words, promises, decrees are not enough. Trust is reconquered in acts, not in speeches.

The Governing Woman: Gender Symbolism in a Revolutionary Context

First woman to exercise presidential power in Venezuela

Delcy Rodriguez is the first woman to exercise presidential power in Venezuelan history — a remarkable historical fact in a country where Chavismo long displayed rhetoric of rupture with traditional elites while maintaining a predominantly male political leadership. The Bolivarian revolution produced many discourses on popular emancipation, but it had never entrusted supreme power to a woman in twenty-five years.

This symbolic dimension is recognized — with a certain irony — even by part of her political adversaries. The circumstances of her accession to power are not those of a democratic triumph: she is president because her patron was arrested in the night by American special forces. But the reality remains: a woman leads Venezuela for the first time. In a country where women's rights have been systematically restricted or theoretically protected without real application, this reality has a significance that history will retain regardless of the circumstances.

Rodriguez between the lines: identity, loyalty, pragmatism

Understanding Rodriguez requires distinguishing several layers. She is a Chavist by conviction — she has followed Chávez from the beginning, she sincerely believes in certain ideals of the Bolivarian revolution, particularly national sovereignty and redistribution of oil wealth. She is also a pragmatic technocrat — intelligent enough to understand that certain economic policies of the Maduro era were disastrous and unsustainable. And she is a political survivor — someone who has navigated twenty years in a brutal and opaque system without being eliminated.

These three identities coexist in her, sometimes in tension. Her liberalizing economic policy contradicts her Bolivarian convictions. Her cooperation with Washington contradicts her sovereignist rhetoric. She lives within these contradictions because she has no choice — it is the condition of whoever wants to govern a real Venezuela rather than the ideal Venezuela of Chavist doctrine. This is not cowardice. It is adaptation to constraint. Time will tell whether this adaptation is sufficient.

Economic Relations with the United States: Normalization in Progress

The priority sectors of reconstruction

Economic normalization between Venezuela and the United States is progressing on several simultaneous fronts since January 2026. The oil sector is the most advanced: operating licenses have been granted to American companies that had been excluded for years. But other sectors are also in play — agriculture, telecommunications, transportation infrastructure — all of which need massive foreign investment to rebuild after two decades of disinvestment.

Rodriguez has clearly signaled that Venezuela is open to American capital. The message is received in Washington with interest but not without caution. American institutional investors demand legal guarantees that the economic environment in Caracas does not yet fully offer: judicial independence, contract protection, reliable arbitration mechanisms, profit convertibility. These guarantees take years to build. The Rodriguez government's goodwill, real as it is, is not enough alone to create in a few months what decades of institutional investment allow to consolidate.

The role of the IMF and international financial institutions

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have re-established technical dialogue with the Rodriguez government — a dialogue interrupted for years under Maduro who refused all external conditionality. These institutions can play a crucial role in economic reconstruction: conditional loans, technical advice on fiscal and monetary policy, credibility signals for private markets.

But IMF conditionality has always been politically explosive in Latin America. The structural adjustment programs of the 1990s remain in collective memory as synonymous with painful social cuts that worsened inequalities. Rodriguez will have to navigate between the economic reform requirements that international financial institutions will pose as conditions for their support, and the Chavist social base that elected its previous governments precisely on the rejection of this type of conditionality. It is a formidable balance to find.

Regional Security: The Militias and Paramilitaries Still Active

The non-state armed structures inherited from Chavismo

An aspect often neglected in analyses of the Venezuelan transition is the persistence of non-state armed structures — the colectivos, paramilitary militias that were used by the Chavist regime for years to maintain order in working-class neighborhoods and repress opponents. These groups, several thousand members in total, did not dissolve with Maduro's arrest. They still exist. They are armed. And their relationship with the new Rodriguez government is ambiguous.

Some colectivos have signaled their loyalty to Rodriguez. Others remain aligned with the hard-line wing represented by Cabello. Others have fragmented into autonomous criminal groups, taking advantage of a control vacuum in certain regions. This multiplicity of armed militias is a real threat to the stability of the Rodriguez government — they can be mobilized to destabilize the transition from within, violently and quickly, if they decide their interests are not served by the new leadership.

Security forces reform: urgent and politically risky

To build a true democracy, Rodriguez will need to reform Venezuela's security forces — police, army, intelligence services — which were deeply politicized under Maduro. This reform is urgent to create the conditions for a credible rule of law. It is also politically extremely risky: many senior officers in these structures have personal reasons to oppose reforms that could expose them to prosecution for abuses committed under Maduro.

Venezuela is not alone in this situation. Other countries in post-authoritarian transition — post-apartheid South Africa, the Balkan countries after 1999 — have had to manage security forces reform as a sine qua non condition of democracy. In all these cases, the process took years, sometimes decades, and was never linear. The international community can help by funding training programs and creating incentives for reformers within the security forces. But the political will must come from within.

Conclusion: Venezuela in Transition — Fragile, Open, Uncertain

A real turning point in a history that had been stuttering for twenty years

January 3, 2026 undeniably marks a turning point in Venezuelan political history. Twenty-five years after Hugo Chávez came to power, the system he built experienced its first major structural break. Maduro is in prison. Rodriguez governs. The United States is recognized as a legitimate interlocutor. Political prisoners have been freed. Economic reforms are underway. These are real, measurable, significant changes.

But a turning point is not a destination. Venezuela remains a profoundly fragile country. Its democratic institutions are atrophied after years of systematic assault. Its economy is in ruins. Its diaspora is dispersed. Its internal political fractures — the Rodriguez-Cabello rivalry, the opposition's divisions, popular distrust — are fault lines that could open violently at any moment. The transition is underway. It is not guaranteed.

What the world must do: engage, demand, accompany

The international community — and primarily the United States, but also the European Union, the democracies of Latin America, and international financial institutions — has a responsibility in this moment of transition. Supporting Rodriguez unconditionally would be a mistake: it would remove all incentive for her to deepen democratic reforms. Conditioning support on measurable results — credible elections, legally guaranteed press freedom, an end to arbitrary detentions, institutional reform — is the only framework that can transform a fragile opening into genuine democratization.

Rodriguez's Venezuela is not yet a democracy. But it is no longer the narco-state of Maduro either. It is in that intermediate space, uncomfortable, unstable, full of possibilities and dangers. It is in this space that the future of 30 million Venezuelans and 7 million members of their diaspora is being decided. They deserve better than to be the pawns of a geopolitical game between great powers. They deserve serious international accompaniment toward something that finally resembles a real democracy.

Signed Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency box

Methodology and sources used

This decoding rests on verifiable journalistic sources documenting events from January 3, 2026 (Maduro's arrest) until the time of writing, June 26, 2026. Primary sources include Reuters dispatches, reports from The Guardian, El País, and Al Jazeera, as well as verified encyclopedic entries on Wikipedia (regarding 2026 events in Venezuela). No fact is invented or inferred without documentary basis.

The opinions expressed in the editorial passages (mini editorials) are those of the columnist, clearly identified as such. The general editorial framing of this analysis reflects a preference for liberal democracy and human rights, without unconditional support for any specific political actor in this transition.

Limitations of the analysis

The situation in Venezuela is evolving rapidly. Some elements of this decoding may be superseded by events subsequent to the date of writing. Information on the internal dynamics of power — notably the Rodriguez-Cabello tensions — comes from open-source analyses and may not reflect the full reality of Venezuelan internal politics. Part of this reality remains opaque by nature.

The economic figures cited (GDP, oil production, diaspora) are estimates based on known institutional sources. They may be revised as more precise official data becomes available.

Sources

Primary sources

BSS News/AFP — Venezuela: Rodriguez marks 6 months post-Maduro — June 23, 2026

Reuters — Delcy Rodriguez formally sworn in as Venezuela's interim president — January 5, 2026

The Guardian — Delcy Rodriguez had signalled cooperation with US before Maduro capture — January 22, 2026

Al Jazeera — US removes sanctions on Venezuela's interim president Delcy Rodriguez — April 1, 2026

Secondary sources

El País (English) — Delcy Rodriguez: Three months as president of Venezuela under Trump's watchful eye — April 6, 2026

Wikipedia — 2026 United States intervention in Venezuela — updated June 2026

NPR — Venezuela's new leader Delcy Rodriguez: between Maduro's shadow and Washington's expectations — February 5, 2026