In Venezuela, a person is murdered every 21 minutes.
Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It comprises an area of 912,050 km2 (352,140 sq mi), with a population estimated at 31.3 million in 2024. The capital and largest urban area is the city of Caracas. The continental territory is bordered on the north by the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Colombia, Brazil on the south, Trinidad and Tobago to the north-east and on the east by Guyana. Venezuela consists of 23 states, the Capital District, and federal dependencies covering Venezuela’s offshore islands. Venezuela is among the most urbanized countries in Latin America; the vast majority of Venezuelans live in the cities of the north and in the capital.
The territory of Venezuela was colonized by Spain in 1522, amid resistance from Indigenous peoples. In 1811, it became one of the first Spanish-American territories to declare independence from the Spanish and to form part of the first federal Republic of Colombia. It separated as a full sovereign country in 1830. During the 19th century, Venezuela suffered political turmoil and autocracy, remaining dominated by regional military dictators until the mid-20th century. From 1958, the country had a series of democratic governments, as an exception where most of the region was ruled by military dictatorships, and the period was characterized by economic prosperity.
Economic shocks in the 1980’s and 1990’s led to major political crises and widespread social unrest, including the deadly Caracazo riots of 1989, two attempted coups in 1992, and the impeachment of a president for embezzlement of public funds charges in 1993. The collapse in confidence in the existing parties saw the 1998 Venezuelan presidential election, the catalyst for the Bolivarian Revolution, which began with a 1999 Constituent Assembly, where a new Constitution of Venezuela was written and ratified. The government’s populist social welfare policies were bolstered by soaring oil prices, temporarily increasing social spending, and reducing economic inequality and poverty in the early years of the regime. However, poverty began to rapidly increase in the 2010’s. The 2013, 2018 and 2024 presidential elections were all widely disputed, with opposition candidates being arrested and/or exiled. This led to widespread protest and international condemnation, which triggered another nationwide crisis that continues to this day. In 2026, the United States captured president Nicolás Maduro. The US announced that it would “run the country” until a provisional Venezuelan administration was in place.
Venezuela is officially a federal presidential republic, but has experienced democratic backsliding into an authoritarian state under the Chávez and Maduro administrations. It ranks poorly on international measurements of freedom of the press, civil liberties, and control of corruption. Venezuela is a developing country, has the world’s largest known oil reserves, and has been one of the world’s leading exporters of oil. Previously, the country was an underdeveloped exporter of agricultural commodities such as coffee and cocoa, but oil quickly came to dominate exports and government revenues. Venezuela struggles with record hyperinflation, shortages of basic goods, unemployment, poverty, disease, high child mortality, malnutrition, environmental issues, severe crime, and widespread corruption. US sanctions and the seizure of Venezuelan assets overseas have cost the country $24–30 billion. These factors have precipitated the Venezuelan refugee crisis in which more than 7.9 million people had fled the country by May 2025. By 2017, Venezuela was declared to be in default regarding debt payments by credit rating agencies. The crisis in Venezuela has contributed to a rapidly deteriorating human rights situation.
In 1498, during his third voyage to the Americas, Christopher Columbus sailed near the Orinoco Delta and landed in the Gulf of Paria. Amazed by the great offshore current of freshwater which deflected his course eastward, Columbus expressed in a letter to Isabella and Ferdinand that he must have reached Heaven on Earth (terrestrial paradise): “Great signs are these of the Terrestrial Paradise… for I have never read or heard of such a large quantity of fresh water being inside and in such close proximity to salt water; the very mild temperateness also corroborates this; and if the water of which I speak does not proceed from Paradise then it is an even greater marvel, because I do not believe such a large and deep river has ever been known to exist in this world.”
In the 16th century, the king of Spain granted a concession to the German Welser family. Klein-Venedig became the most extensive initiative in the German colonization of the Americas from 1528 to 1546. The Welsers were bankers to the Habsburgs and financiers of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, who was King of Spain and had borrowed heavily from them to pay bribes for his Imperial election.
In 1528, Charles V granted the Welsers the right to explore, rule and colonize the territory, as well as to seek the mythical golden town of El Dorado. The first expedition was led by Ambrosius Ehinger, who established Maracaibo in 1529. After the deaths of first Ehinger in 1533, then Nikolaus Federmann, and Georg von Speyer in 1540, Philipp von Hutten persisted in exploring the interior. In absence of von Hutten from the capital of the province, the crown of Spain claimed the right to appoint a governor.
On Hutten’s return to the capital, Santa Ana de Coro, in 1546, the Spanish governor Juan de Carvajal had Hutten and Bartholomeus VI. Welser executed. Subsequently, Charles V revoked Welser’s concession. The Welsers transported German miners to the colony, in addition to 4,000 African slaves to plant sugar cane plantations. Many German colonists died from tropical diseases, to which they had no immunity, or through wars with the Indigenous inhabitants.
Native caciques such as Guaicaipuro (c. 1530–1568) and Tamanaco (died 1573) attempted to resist Spanish incursions, but the newcomers ultimately subdued them.
In the 16th century, during the Spanish colonization, indigenous peoples such as the Mariches, themselves descendants of the Kalina, were converted to Roman Catholicism. Some resisting tribes or leaders are commemorated in place names, including Caracas, Chacao and Los Teques. The early colonial settlements focused on the northern coast, but in the mid-18th century, the Spanish pushed farther inland along the Orinoco River. Here, the Ye’kuana organized resistance in 1775–1776.
Spain’s eastern Venezuelan settlements were incorporated into New Andalusia Province. Administered by the Royal Audiencia of Santo Domingo from the early 16th century, most of Venezuela became part of the Viceroyalty of New Granada in the early 18th century, and was then reorganized as an autonomous Captaincy General starting in 1777. Caracas, founded in the central coastal region in 1567, was well-placed to become a key location, being near the coastal port of La Guaira and in a valley, in a mountain range, providing defensive strength against pirates and a more fertile and healthy climate.
After unsuccessful uprisings, Venezuela, under the leadership of Francisco de Miranda, a Venezuelan marshal who had fought in the American and French Revolutions, declared independence as the First Republic of Venezuela on July 5, 1811. This began the Venezuelan War of Independence. A devastating Caracas earthquake in 1812, together with the rebellion of the Venezuelan llaneros, helped bring down the republic. Simón Bolívar, new leader of the independentist forces, launched his Admirable Campaign in 1813 from New Granada, retaking most of the territory and being proclaimed as El Libertador. A Second Republic of Venezuela was proclaimed on August 7, 1813, but lasted only a few months before being crushed by royalist caudillo José Tomás Boves and his personal army of llaneros.
The end of the French invasion of homeland Spain in 1814 allowed a large expeditionary force to come under general Pablo Morillo, with the goal to regain the lost territory in Venezuela and New Granada. As the war reached a stalemate on 1817, Bolívar reestablished the Third Republic of Venezuela on the territory still controlled by the patriots, mainly in the Guayana and Llanos regions. This republic was short-lived as only two years later, during the Congress of Angostura of 1819, the union of Venezuela with New Granada was decreed to form the Republic of Colombia.
The war continued until full victory and sovereignty was attained after the Battle of Carabobo on June 24, 1821. On July 24, 1823, José Prudencio Padilla and Rafael Urdaneta helped seal Venezuelan independence with their victory in the Battle of Lake Maracaibo. New Granada’s congress gave Bolívar control of the Granadian army; leading it, he liberated several countries and founded the Republic of Colombia.
Sucre went on to liberate Ecuador and become the second president of Bolivia. Venezuela remained part of Gran Colombia until 1830, when a rebellion led by José Antonio Páez allowed the proclamation of a newly independent Venezuela, on September 22; Páez became the first president of the new State of Venezuela. Between one-quarter and one-third of Venezuela’s population was lost during these two decades of war, which by 1830, was estimated at 800,000. In the Flag of Venezuela, the yellow stands for land wealth, the blue for the sea that separates Venezuela from Spain, and the red for the blood shed by the heroes of independence.
Slavery in Venezuela was abolished in 1854. Much of Venezuela’s 19th-century history was characterized by political turmoil and dictatorial rule, including the Independence leader José Antonio Páez, who gained the presidency three times and served 11 years between 1830 and 1863. This culminated in the Federal War of 1859–1863. In the latter half of the century, Antonio Guzmán Blanco, another caudillo, served 13 years, between 1870 and 1887, with three other presidents interspersed.
In 1895, a longstanding dispute with Great Britain about the Essequibo territory, which Britain claimed as part of British Guiana and Venezuela saw as Venezuelan territory, erupted into the Venezuela Crisis of 1895. The dispute became a diplomatic crisis when Venezuela’s lobbyist, William L. Scruggs, sought to argue that British behavior over the issue violated the United States’ Monroe Doctrine of 1823, and used his influence in Washington, D.C., to pursue the matter. Then, US president Grover Cleveland adopted a broad interpretation of the doctrine that declared an American interest in any matter within the hemisphere. Britain ultimately accepted arbitration, but in negotiations over its terms was able to persuade the US on many details. A tribunal convened in Paris in 1898 to decide the issue and in 1899 awarded the bulk of the disputed territory to British Guiana.
In 1899, Cipriano Castro, assisted by his friend Juan Vicente Gómez, seized power in Caracas. Castro defaulted on Venezuela’s considerable foreign debts and declined to pay compensation to foreigners caught up in Venezuela’s civil wars. This led to the Venezuela Crisis of 1902–1903, in which Britain, Germany and Italy imposed a naval blockade before international arbitration at the new Permanent Court of Arbitration was agreed. In 1908, another dispute broke out with the Netherlands, which was resolved when Castro left for medical treatment in Germany and was promptly overthrown by Juan Vicente Gómez in 1908–1935.
The discovery of massive oil deposits in Lake Maracaibo during World War I proved pivotal for Venezuela and transformed its economy from a heavy dependence on agricultural exports. It prompted a boom that lasted into the 1980’s; by 1935, Venezuela’s per capita gross domestic product was Latin America’s highest. Gómez benefited handsomely from this, as corruption thrived, but at the same time, the new source of income helped him centralize the state and develop its authority.
Gómez remained the most powerful man in Venezuela until his death in 1935. The gomecista dictatorship (1935–1945) system largely continued under Eleazar López Contreras, but from 1941, under Isaías Medina Angarita, was relaxed. Angarita granted a range of reforms, including the legalization of all political parties. After World War II, immigration from Southern Europe and poorer Latin American countries markedly diversified Venezuelan society.
In 1945, a civilian-military coup overthrew Medina Angarita and ushered in a period of democratic rule (1945–1948) under the mass membership party Democratic Action, initially under Rómulo Betancourt, until Rómulo Gallegos won the 1947 Venezuelan presidential election; the first free and fair elections in Venezuela. Gallegos governed until overthrown by a military junta led by the triumvirate Luis Felipe Llovera Páez, Marcos Pérez Jiménez, and Gallegos’ Defense Minister, Carlos Delgado Chalbaud, in the 1948 Venezuelan coup d’état.
The most powerful man in the military junta (1948–58) was Pérez Jiménez and he was suspected of being behind the death of Chalbaud, who died in a bungled kidnapping in 1950. When the junta unexpectedly lost the 1952 presidential election, it ignored the results and Jiménez was installed as president. Jiménez was forced out on January 23, 1958. In an effort to consolidate a young democracy, the three major political parties, COPEI and Unión Republicana Democrática, with the notable exception of the Communist Party of Venezuela, signed the Puntofijo Pact power-sharing agreement. COPEI and Unión Republicana Democrática dominated the political landscape for four decades.
During the presidencies of Rómulo Betancourt (1959–64) and Raúl Leoni (1964–69), substantial guerilla movements occurred. Most laid down their arms under Rafael Caldera’s first presidency (1969–74). Caldera had won the 1968 election for COPEI and Unión Republicana Democrática, the first time a party other than Democratic Action took the presidency through a democratic election. The new democratic order had its antagonists. Betancourt suffered an attack planned by the Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo in 1960, and the leftists excluded from the Pact initiated an insurgency by organizing themselves into the Armed Forces of National Liberation, sponsored by the Communist Party and Fidel Castro. In 1962 they tried to destabilize the military corps, with failed revolts. Betancourt promoted a foreign policy, the Betancourt Doctrine, in which he only recognized elected governments by popular vote.
The 1973 Venezuelan presidential election of Carlos Andrés Pérez coincided with an oil crisis, in which Venezuela’s income exploded as oil prices soared; oil industries were nationalized in 1976. This led to massive increases in public spending, but also increases in external debts, until the collapse of oil prices during the 1980’s crippled the economy. As the government started to devalue the currency in 1983 to face its financial obligations, standards of living fell dramatically. Failed economic policies and increasing corruption in government led to rising poverty and crime, worsening social indicators, and increased political instability.
In the 1980’s, the Presidential Commission for State Reform (COPRE) emerged as a mechanism of political innovation. Venezuela decentralized its political system and diversified its economy, reducing the size of the state. COPRE operated as an innovation mechanism, also by incorporating issues into the political agenda, that were excluded from public deliberation by the main actors of the democratic system. The most discussed topics were incorporated into the public agenda: decentralization, political participation, municipalization, judicial order reforms and the role of the state in a new economic strategy. The social reality made the changes difficult to apply.
Economic crises in the 1980’s and 1990’s led to a political crisis. Hundreds of people were killed by security forces and the military in the Caracazo riots of 1989, during the second presidential term of Carlos Andrés Pérez (1989–1993) and after the implementation of economic austerity measures. Hugo Chávez, who in 1982 had promised to depose the bipartisanship governments, used the growing anger at economic austerity measures to justify a coup attempt in February 1992; a second coup d’état attempt occurred in November.
President Carlos Andrés Pérez (re-elected in 1988) was impeached under embezzlement charges in 1993, leading to the interim presidency of Ramón José Velásquez (1993–1994). Coup leader Chávez was pardoned in March 1994 by president Rafael Caldera (1994–1999, his second term), with a clean slate and his political rights reinstated, allowing Chávez to win and maintain the presidency continuously from 1999 until his death in 2013. Chávez won the elections of 1998, 2000, 2006 and 2012 and the presidential referendum of 2004.
A collapse in confidence in the existing parties led to Hugo Chávez being elected president in 1998 and the subsequent launch of a “Bolivarian Revolution,” beginning with a 1999 constituent assembly to write a new Constitution. The Revolution refers to a left-wing populist social movement and political process led by Chávez, who founded the Fifth Republic Movement in 1997 and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela in 2007. The “Bolivarian Revolution” is named after Simón Bolívar.
According to Chávez and other supporters, the “Bolivarian Revolution” sought to build a mass movement to implement Bolivarianism—popular democracy, economic independence, equitable distribution of revenues, and an end to political corruption. They interpret Bolívar’s ideas from a populist perspective, using socialist rhetoric. This led to formation of the Fifth Republic of Venezuela, commonly known as the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, that continues to the present day. Venezuela has been considered the Bolivarian Republic following the adoption of the new Constitution of 1999.
Following Chávez’s election, Venezuela developed into a dominant-party system, dominated by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela. In April 2002, Chávez was briefly ousted from power in the 2002 Venezuelan coup d’état attempt following demonstrations by his opponents. Efforts by interim president Pedro Carmona to nullify the 1999 constitution and undo Chávez’s reforms provoked popular outcry, and caused support by the military for the coup to wane. Chávez returned after two days as a result of demonstrations by Chávez supporters and actions by the military. Chávez remained in power after an all-out national strike that lasted from December 2002 to February 2003, including a strike/lockout in the state oil company PDVSA. Following the failed coup attempt, Chávez sought to limit the influence of his political opponents by promoting state television and restricting the influence of privately owned media. Chávez survived further political tests, including an August 2004 recall referendum. He was elected for another term in December 2006. The first US sanctions against Venezuelan officials were imposed in 2008.
Income inequality declined to the lowest rate in Latin America and Venezuelans’ quality of life improved at the third fastest rate worldwide during Chávez’s administration. From 2006 to 2011, Venezuela moved up seven spots on the Human Development Index, to 73 out of 187. The poverty rate declined from 48.6% to 29.5% from 2002 to 2011. The economy grew by 95% from 2003 to 2010. Social spending per person tripled, and access to healthcare and education improved. Chávez initiated Bolivarian missions, programs aimed at helping the poor. The missions increased health coverage, improved education and virtually eliminated illiteracy, but failed to meet their housing goals. During Mission Robinson, nearly 1.5 million adults learned to read.
The 2008 financial crisis led to a decline in the price of oil. Unlike countries such as China and Bolivia, who used well-timed public sector stimulus to avoid economic contractions during this period, Venezuela’s public sector growth fell, and the economy at large contracted. Venezuela’s currency was overvalued, causing its exports to be unusually expensive and its imports unusually cheap, making diversification away from oil more challenging. In the subsequent decade, the government was forced into currency devaluations. These devaluations did not improve the situation of the people who rely on imported products or locally produced products that depend on imported inputs, while dollar-denominated oil sales account for the majority of exports. The profits of the oil industry were lost to “social engineering” and corruption, instead of investments needed to maintain oil production.
Maduro has been president of Venezuela since April 14, 2013, when he won the presidential election after Chavez’ death, with 51% of the vote, against Henrique Capriles on 49%. The Democratic Unity Roundtable contested Maduro’s election as fraud, but an audit of 56% of the vote showed no discrepancies, and the Supreme Court of Venezuela ruled Maduro was the legitimate president.
Venezuela devalued its currency in February 2013 due to rising shortages, which included milk and other necessities. This led to an increase in malnutrition, especially among children. The economy had become dependent on the exportation of oil, with crude accounting for 86% of exports, and a high price per barrel to support social programs. The reliance of Chávez’s socioeconomic policies on oil sales and importing goods resulted in large amounts of debt, no change to corruption in Venezuela and culminated into a crisis in Venezuela. From 2006 to 2013, PDVSA’s external debt increased from $3 billion to $35 billion. Beginning in 2014 the price of oil plummeted from over $100 to $40. The Government began taking more money from PDVSA, the state oil company, resulting in a lack of reinvestment in fields and employees. Production decreased from its height of nearly 3 to 1 million barrels (480 to 160 thousand cubic metres) per day. In 2014, Venezuela entered a recession, and in 2015 had the world’s highest inflation, surpassing 100%. From 2014 to 2024, roughly 7.7 million people emigrated from Venezuela.
Since February 2014, hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans have protested over high levels of crime, corruption, hyperinflation, and chronic scarcity of basic goods due to government policies. Demonstrations and riots have resulted in over 40 fatalities in the unrest between Chavistas and opposition protesters and opposition leaders, including Leopoldo López and Antonio Ledezma were arrested. Human rights groups condemned the arrest of López. In late 2014, the Barack Obama administration imposed additional unilateral sanctions on Venezuelan officials involved in the crackdown on the protests. In the summer of 2015, the Venezuelan military initiatied an operation in response to opposition paramilitary attacks on police and civil society establishments. In the 2015 Venezuelan parliamentary election, the opposition gained a two-thirds majority. The opposition sought to reverse many Chavez era laws, such as the nationalization of telecommunications and news broadcasting, and secure amnesty for imprisoned opposition leaders charged with corruption or leading violent protests. It also considered a recall campaign against Maduro, but this was infeasible since 7.5 million new voters had been registered since the last recall effort, increasing the number of signatures needed for a recall election. The first law passed by the opposition granted amnesty from prosecution for offenses committed since January 1999, including participation in the 2002 coup attempt.
In January 2016, Maduro decreed an “economic emergency”, revealing the extent of the crisis and expanding his powers. The government established committees to oversee local food distribution, called CLAPs. Government officials blamed economic sabotage by business interests for the economic crisis, citing examples of eggs and milk being destroyed on the orders of business owners. Corruption also played a role, with shortages incentivizing selfish behavior and the exploitation of social programs. Venezuelans, including some Chavistas criticized the government for being too soft on corruption. In July 2016, Colombian border crossings were temporarily opened to allow Venezuelans to purchase food and basic health items. In September 2016, a study indicated 15% of Venezuelans were eating “food waste discarded by commercial establishments.” 200 prison riots had occurred by October 2016.
The Maduro-aligned Supreme Tribunal, which had been overturning National Assembly decisions since the opposition took control in 2015, took over the functions of the assembly, creating the 2017 Venezuelan constitutional crisis. In August 2017, the 2017 Constituent National Assembly was elected and stripped the National Assembly of its powers. The election raised concerns of an emerging dictatorship. In December 2017, Maduro declared opposition parties barred from the following year’s presidential vote after they boycotted mayoral polls. Opposition leaders and some international media consider Maduro’s government a dictatorship.
In August 2017, US president Donald Trump’s administration imposed more economic sanctions against PDVSA and Venezuelan officials. US sanctions against Venezuela would escalate over the next two years as part of the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” strategy against the Maduro government. Sanctions in 2017 disallowed US citizens from buying Venezuelan debt and blocked dividend payments to US nationals, crippling PDVSA finances. Another round of sanctions in 2018 and 2019 amounted to an embargo on gold, oil, finance, defense and other public and private entities. $22 billion worth of Venezuelan assets held overseas were frozen. The Trump administration pressured non-US entities to reduce their purchases of Venezuelan oil, and intimidated European financial institutions into dropping Venezuelan clients. Francisco Rodriguez said that sanctions were responsible for 59% of the decline in Venezuelan oil production after August 2017. Sanctions have resulted in international banks blocking payments for medicines, fearing retribution from the US Office of Foreign Assets Control.
Maduro won the 2018 election with 68% of the vote. The result was challenged by Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, France and the US, which deemed it fraudulent and recognized Juan Guaidó as president. Other countries continued to recognize Maduro, although China, facing financial pressure over its position, began hedging by decreasing loans, cancelling joint ventures, and signaling willingness to work with all parties. In August 2019, Trump imposed an economic embargo against Venezuela. The EU and Canada also sanctioned Venezuela. The sanctions froze more than $7 billion in additional Venezuelan assets and embargoed Venezuelan petroleum. Between 2014 and 2020, Venezuela lost 99% of its foreign currency income. Due to the impact of the sanctions, Maduro’s government had to implement anti-blockade policies that increased the confidentiality of business transactions with the government, and allowed it to make deals in contravention of constitutional prohibitions on private majority shareholders.
In March 2020, the US Department of Justice indicted Maduro and Venezuelan officials, on charges of drug trafficking, narcoterrorism, and corruption. In May 2020, Venezuelan dissidents backed by Silvercorp USA attempted to infiltrate Venezuela by sea and overthrow Maduro in Operation Gideon. The owner of Silvercorp, an ex-US special operations sergeant, said he met with Trump administration officials about the plan. In 2021, American and European financial institutions blocked Venezuela’s payments to Covax, preventing it from acquiring COVID-19 vaccines. Sanctions also prevented Venezuela from obtaining oil dilutants, which are needed to turn the heavy crude it produces into an exportable petroleum product. A 2021 deal with Iran gave Venezuela access to dilutants that allowed it to marginally increase its oil production.
Venezuela went from being one of the richest countries in Latin America to one of the poorest. From 2013 to 2020, the economy shrank by 80%. As a result, the Venezuelan refugee crisis, the largest emigration of people in Latin America’s history, occurred, with over 7 million – about 20% of the country’s population – emigrating.
In June 2020, a report documented enforced disappearances that occurred in 2018–19. Some 724 enforced disappearances of political detainees were reported. According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), between 2016 and 2019, Venezuela’s security forces killed over 19,000 people for alleged “resistance to authority.” HRW stated that evidence showed that many of the killings were extrajudicial executions. The report stated that Venezuelan security forces had subjected victims to torture. The report stated that the government used enforced disappearances to silence opponents and other critical voices.
Maduro ran for a third consecutive term in the 2024 presidential election, while former diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia represented the Unitary Platform, the main opposition political alliance. Polls conducted before the election indicated that González would win by a wide margin. After the government-controlled National Electoral Council (CNE) announced partial results showing a narrow Maduro victory on July 29, world leaders predominantly expressed skepticism of the claimed results and did not recognize the CNE claims with only some exceptions.
Both González and Maduro proclaimed themselves winners of the election. The results of the election were not recognized by the Carter Center and Organization of American States due to the lack of granular results, and disputed by the opposition, which claimed a landslide victory and released access to vote tallies collected by poll watchers from a majority of polling centers as proof.
In January 2026, following increasing tensions between the United States and the Venezuelan government, the United States launched airstrikes across the coastline of Venezuela as part of Operation Southern Spear. US President Donald Trump announced in a post on social media that Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro had been captured and flown out of the country. In a later post, Trump said that the United States will “run” Venezuela until a safe transition of the country’s leadership can take place. However, the regime formerly led by Maduro remains in control, with Vice President Delcy Rodríguez being appointed interim president.
So what happens now?
If Maduro were tried, convicted, and imprisoned for life, that would be a shock event for Venezuela—comparable to the fall of a long-entrenched authoritarian regime. What follows would depend less on Maduro himself and more on how he is removed and who controls the transition.
Below is the most realistic trajectory, broken into phases.
1. Immediate aftermath (0–6 months)
Political
Power vacuum risk is the biggest danger.
Three actors would compete for control:
Chavismo without Maduro (party elites, governors, ministers)
Military high command (the true power broker)
Opposition / transitional coalition
Most likely outcome:
A temporary transitional government backed (or tolerated) by the military.
Maduro’s removal would not automatically dismantle Chavismo; many officials would try to rebrand and survive.
Worst case:
Military factionalism → instability or short-lived juntas.
Best case:
A negotiated transition with international guarantees.
2. Short-term political restructuring (6–24 months)
Political reforms (likely but uneven)
Release of political prisoners
Partial restoration of judiciary independence
Electoral reforms with international observers
Legal reckoning for some officials, but not all (amnesty deals are common)
Important reality: A full “clean sweep” is unlikely. Countries that try mass purges usually collapse further. Venezuela would likely choose selective accountability.
Risks
Revenge politics
Fragmented opposition unable to govern
Chavista loyalist sabotage inside institutions
3. Economic consequences (this is where the biggest change happens)
Immediate effects
Sanctions relief would likely be rapid and substantial
Oil exports normalize quickly (within months, not years)
Currency stabilizes (not strong, but predictable)
Foreign capital returns cautiously
Medium-term (2–5 years)
If reforms are credible:
GDP growth rebounds sharply (from a very low base)
Hyperinflation stays dead
Infrastructure investment begins (oil, power, ports)
PDVSA likely restructured or partially privatized
However:
Poverty does not disappear quickly
Inequality may rise at first
Corruption remains a major drag
Venezuela would resemble:
Post-Soviet Eastern Europe, not a miracle economy
4. Social and migration impact
Migration
Emigration slows within 1–2 years
Some return migration begins, mostly skilled workers
Full reversal takes a decade or more
Public mood
Initial euphoria
Followed by frustration when life doesn’t improve overnight
High risk of populist backlash if expectations aren’t managed
5. International position
Venezuela is re-absorbed into the global system
U.S., EU, IMF, World Bank re-engage
Debt restructuring begins (painful but necessary)
Regional relations normalize
No country would try to “control” Venezuela—but international institutions would heavily influence policy via loans and conditions.
6. Long-term outcomes (5–15 years)
Best-case scenario
Hybrid social democracy
Competitive elections
Oil + diversification
Similar to Colombia or Peru (on a good decade)
Middle-case (most likely)
Corrupt but pluralistic democracy
Strong presidency, weak institutions
Periodic crises, but no collapse
Worst-case
Post-Maduro strongman replaces him
Chavismo mutates instead of disappearing
Cycle of instability repeats
Bottom line
Maduro going to prison would be necessary but not sufficient for Venezuela’s recovery.
What truly decides the country’s future:
The role of the military
Whether institutions are rebuilt, not just leaders replaced
Whether the opposition governs competently
Whether oil wealth is managed differently this time