Trump to Meet Machado After Backing Venezuela Successor/ Newslooks/ WASHINGTON/ J. Mansour/ Morning Edition/ Trump will meet Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado after previously siding with Maduro’s successor. Though Machado led a widely disputed 2024 election victory, Trump has questioned her legitimacy. His administration has opened dialogue with acting President Delcy Rodríguez.
Trump’s Venezuela Pivot Quick Looks
- Trump to meet Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado Thursday
- Meeting follows U.S. capture of Nicolás Maduro and his wife in Caracas
- Trump recently spoke with and praised acting President Delcy Rodríguez
- Rodríguez has released prisoners and cooperated with U.S. requests
- Trump questions Machado’s leadership despite her electoral win
- Machado remains in hiding since brief detention in Caracas
- She offered to share Nobel Prize with Trump; rejected by institute
- Trump’s stance reflects a pragmatic shift in Venezuela policy
Trump to Meet Machado After Backing Venezuela Successor
Deep Look
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet Thursday with Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado at the White House, in a move that comes amid shifting U.S. strategy toward Venezuela’s post-Maduro leadership. Machado, a longtime critic of Venezuela’s socialist regime and the face of the democratic opposition, is widely seen as the legitimate winner of the country’s 2024 presidential election—results that were rejected by then-President Nicolás Maduro before his dramatic arrest by U.S. forces earlier this month.
Just days after the covert U.S. military operation that brought Maduro and his wife to New York to face drug trafficking charges, Trump is attempting to navigate a new political landscape in Venezuela. But his recent embrace of acting President Delcy Rodríguez—Maduro’s former vice president—has cast doubt on the United States’ commitment to backing Venezuela’s democratic transition.
“She’s a very nice woman,” Trump said of Machado during a Reuters interview ahead of their meeting. “I’ve seen her on television. I think we’re just going to talk basics.”
Trump’s casual tone masks a deeper diplomatic realignment. While his administration has long positioned itself as a supporter of Venezuelan opposition movements, Trump’s warm rhetoric toward Rodríguez—and his suggestion that Machado lacks domestic support—has signaled a break with traditional U.S. policy.
Rodríguez, who stepped in as acting leader after Maduro’s removal, has adopted a more conciliatory tone toward the United States. In recent days, she has cooperated with Trump’s requests to release political prisoners, including several detained Americans, a move welcomed by Washington.
Trump told reporters Wednesday that he had a “great conversation” with Rodríguez, their first since Maduro’s ouster. “We had a call, a long call. We discussed a lot of things,” he said. “And I think we’re getting along very well with Venezuela.”
Machado’s Struggle for Legitimacy
Despite having led the opposition to Maduro in the 2024 election, Machado has struggled to gain full recognition. Though her party’s victory was widely documented by international observers, Venezuela’s ruling-party-controlled electoral council declared Maduro the winner, prompting mass protests and violent crackdowns.
Trump’s cool reception of Machado following Maduro’s capture stunned many of her allies. Just hours after the news broke, Trump said, “It would be very tough for her to be the leader. She doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country.”
This marked a sharp pivot from earlier Republican support. Machado had spent years cultivating relationships with GOP leaders, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and had positioned herself as a trusted U.S. partner. She has publicly thanked Trump for his support in the past and even offered to share her 2025 Nobel Peace Prize with him—a symbolic gesture the Nobel Institute rejected.
Her current status remains unclear. After briefly being detained in Caracas in early 2025, Machado disappeared from public view. She resurfaced briefly in Oslo, Norway, last December, where her daughter accepted the Nobel Prize on her behalf.
Machado’s background as an industrial engineer and political activist dates back to 2004, when she co-founded the NGO Súmate and campaigned for a recall vote against then-President Hugo Chávez. Though the effort failed, it catapulted her into the national spotlight and earned the ire of Venezuela’s ruling class. Her 2005 visit to Washington to meet with President George W. Bush further strained her relationship with the Chávez government.
More recently, she mobilized millions of voters in the 2024 election against Maduro. The opposition’s claims of victory were backed by both independent audits and exit polls, but the regime refused to relinquish power, igniting a wave of civil unrest. Security forces responded with brutal force, detaining protest leaders and deploying the military to quash demonstrations.
Trump’s Calculated Realignment
Trump’s decision to pivot toward Rodríguez appears to be a pragmatic calculation, part of a broader realignment in his second-term foreign policy toward Latin America. The administration appears more interested in maintaining regional stability and strategic influence than in backing symbolic figures with uncertain control on the ground.
Rodríguez, for her part, has presented herself as a transitional leader willing to cooperate with the U.S. on key issues, including prisoner releases, counternarcotics efforts, and economic stabilization. Trump has offered tacit endorsement of her leadership, even as his officials insist they are still committed to supporting democratic institutions in Venezuela.
For Machado, Thursday’s meeting is likely to be a test of how much influence she still holds in Washington. While she remains a symbol of resistance, her political future is clouded by Trump’s preference for dealing with those already in power.
Observers say her appearance at the White House may help revive U.S. attention to Venezuela’s ongoing democratic struggles. But with Trump signaling that he may continue working with Rodríguez, Machado could find herself sidelined in the very government she fought to lead.
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