#us-intervention

#us-intervention

For years, Luis Peche, a 31-year-old political consultant, dreamed of a Venezuela without its leader, Nicolas Maduro. Living under Maduro's rule, Peche saw friends flee the country for fear of hunger and repression. Others were imprisoned for their activism. Then, in May 2025, Peche himself was forced into exile after being tipped off that security forces were preparing to arrest him. He has lived in Colombia ever since.

"Don't go!" more than one voice could be heard shouting in the packed Teatro Colón on January 24. The plea was in response to Colombian senator María José Pizarro Rodríguez's declaration that Colombia's President Gustavo Petro would be traveling to the White House on February 3 "in an act of courage." While the popular Pacto Histórico senator was mostly met with cheers and chants of the Chilean protest song, " El pueblo unido jamás será vencido,"

It was not just another bombastic statement in the Republican's provocative style it was the first visible sign of a policy that once again places the region under U.S. oversight. Trump revived old interventionist instincts by interfering in Honduras's presidential election and threatening to cut aid to Central American governments as leverage to force them into agreements aimed at curbing migration.

There's a reason why there's no profit motive in government,

This week, Sanchez did not wait for a joint EU statement to issue judgment on the US's illegal military intervention to capture the Venezuelan president, Nicolas Maduro: he swiftly joined Latin American countries in condemning it. A few hours later he went even further, saying the operation in Caracas represented a terrible precedent and a very dangerous one [which] reminds us of past aggressions, and pushes the world toward a future of uncertainty and insecurity, similar to what we already experienced after other invasions driven by the thirst for oil.

the capture of Nicolas Maduro. However, the outlook darkened as the hours passed, and the main anti-Chavista leaders, headed by Maria Corina Machado, adjusted their priorities in response to Donald Trump's affront. While the initial reaction of the opposition leadership was a willingness to immediately replace Chavismo, the harsh reality imposed by the Republican president's choice of Delcy Rodriguez ultimately redefined their strategy.

I watched the January 3 rd nightly coverage on CBS and NBC of the U.S. assault on Venezuela and the kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, and what I witnessed was not journalism but the choreography of propaganda. CBS, in particular, offered thirty uninterrupted minutes of state-sanctioned fantasy, anchored by a fawning interview with Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, a man implicated in the killing of more than one hundred people at sea without evidence, accountability, or due process.

Nicolás Maduro wasn't due to arrive at his arraignment yesterday in downtown Manhattan until noon, but a large crowd had already formed outside the federal courthouse by 9 a.m. Actually, two crowds. One had come to tell Donald Trump to keep his hands off Venezuela. The other, which seemed largely Venezuelan, had come to celebrate. Maduro was, until Saturday, a widely hated ruler. His last election campaign consisted of threatening his people with a "bloodbath" if he lost.

As a stunned world processes the U.S. government's sudden intervention in Venezuela - debating its legality, guessing who the ultimate winners and losers will be - a company founded in California with deep ties to the Golden State could be among the prime beneficiaries. Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves on the planet. Chevron, the international petroleum conglomerate with a massive refinery in El Segundo and headquartered, until recently,