In a historic act of sycophancy, Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado gave President Donald Trump her 18-carat gold Nobel Peace Prize medal on Thursday as he attempts to “run” Venezuela from Washington. But given Trump’s views of Venezuela, Machado’s bid to get in his good graces and have Trump put her and her allies in power there is unlikely to work. Because Trump doesn’t care about the things Machado cares about.
Machado has been the most prominent face of Venezuela’s opposition to Maduro for years, and, seeing the United States’ aggression as an opportunity for her and her allies to take power, she supported Trump’s militaristic pressure campaign against Maduro in the fall. After Trump ousted Maduro this month, Machado said, “The hour has arrived for popular sovereignty and national sovereignty to rule in our country. We are ready to make our mandate count, and to take power.” (Machado’s claim of a “mandate” refers to a finding from international observers and independent election experts that the opposition leader she backed, Edmundo González, won the country’s 2024 election and that Maduro rigged the final results to stay in power.)
Trump is much more focused on keeping the country stable while angling to open up and renew its oil infrastructure for U.S. oil companies.
But Trump snubbed her. He did not turn to Machado to help determine Venezuela’s new leader but instead backed Maduro’s former vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, as acting president. Machado has been left out in the cold and has tried to find a way back into Trump world to make her case. She then settled on handing over her Nobel medal, perhaps because he was reportedly frustrated that Machado received the award last year even after his desperate and unsuccessful lobbying campaign for it. (The Norwegian Nobel Committee has said that the title for the award cannot be shared or transferred.)
Some commentators view Machado’s spectacular obsequiousness as a masterstroke because it plays to Trump’s ego. But it’s unlikely to make a difference for the foreseeable future. That’s because Trump is much more focused on keeping the country stable while angling to open up and renew its oil infrastructure for U.S. oil companies, and has shown no interest in Venezuelan democracy. He didn’t even use the word “democracy” in the news conference he held after he ousted Maduro.
Trump said immediately after his detainment of Maduro that he was skeptical of installing Machado because she lacks “the respect within the country.” As New York University historian Alejandro Velasco has pointed out, “More likely for Trump, Machado didn’t have the respect of the people who matter in a transition: military, police, institutions.”
Experts on Venezuela point out that tensions between Machado and the military is key to understanding Trump’s assessment. “The military is part of the Maduro regime within Venezuela, they’re part of the autocratic, authoritarian rule and the repression, and so they would be worried about the possibility of facing some form of justice,” Gabriel Hetland, an associate professor of Latin American Studies and sociology at SUNY Albany, told me. He said Machado “would want to punish people for genuine human rights abuses.”
“The Trump administration just recognizes that she’s just so foaming-at-the-mouth opposed to this government that they don’t want to risk the chaos, the confrontation,” Hetland added.
Though Trump didn’t mention democracy in that first news conference after the U.S. military extracted Maduro, he did talk about his effort to bend the country’s government to his will and his interest in extracting its oil. Put it all together and Trump’s “regime change lite” — keeping Maduro’s regime intact while coercing it into opening itself up to U.S. investment and oil extraction — makes the most sense for his specific set of imperialistic goals.
The Trump administration has provided no details or timeline for when it expects to see free elections take place in Venezuela. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Thursday that Trump was “committed to hopefully seeing elections in Venezuela one day.” “But I don’t have an updated timetable for you today,” she added. Hopefully. One day. Machado gave her Nobel Peace Prize medal to Trump and couldn’t even get a commitment to elections in return.
Zeeshan Aleem is a writer for MS NOW. Sign up for his newsletter. 
