For the third time, Nicolás Maduro has raised his hand for a swearing-in ceremony as president of Venezuela, while he continues to bring down his fist on the people of Venezuela and their democratic aspirations.
Maduro’s swearing-in took place on January 10, six months after an election that most international observers acknowledge was fraudulent. Publicly available electoral records show that opposition leader Edmundo González decisively won the contest. González left Venezuela in September for exile in Spain after a warrant was issued for his arrest. Hundreds of Venezuelans, who protested the fraudulent outcome of the election, have been arrested by the Maduro regime.
Protests, however, have not stopped. The day before Maduro’s swearing-in, hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Caracas decrying Maduro’s power grab. Opposition leader and former law maker María Corina Machado was reportedly briefly arrested and released during the ensuing crackdown by the authorities.
In a statement, Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Maduro’s inauguration “illegitimate.” He wrote, “The Venezuelan people and the world know the truth – Maduro clearly lost the 2024 presidential election and has no right to claim the presidency.”
In solidarity with the Venezuelan people, said Secretary Blinken, the United States and its partners around the world are taking action. Among the U.S. measures, the State Department has raised its reward offers to up to $25 million each for information leading to the arrests and/or convictions of Maduro and his Minister of Interior Diosdado Cabello. It is also imposing new visa restrictions on Maduro-aligned individuals for their role in undermining the electoral process or engaging in acts of repression.
Concurrently, the Treasury Department is sanctioning eight Venezuelan officials who lead key economic and security agencies enabling Maduro’s repression and subversion of democracy.
U.S. partners, including Canada, the European Union, and the United Kingdom have taken similar steps to “demonstrate a message of solidarity with the Venezuelan people, and further elevate international efforts to maintain pressure on Maduro and his representatives,” the Treasury Department wrote in a separate statement.
Secretary of State Blinken condemned Maduro and his representatives for resorting to violence and intimidation against their political opponents and the Venezuelan people. He called for the release of all political prisoners and underscored that “all Venezuelans must be allowed to express their political opinions peacefully, including the exercise of freedoms of peaceful assembly and of expression, without fear of reprisal.”