by Jacob G. Hornberger

January 8, 2026

One can fully understand any hatred that Venezuelan citizens might now have for the U.S. government. Just think: the U.S. government is now openly supporting the brutal tyranny under which the Venezuelan people have long suffered under the illegitimate Chavista regime. Why shouldn’t they hate the U.S. government?

Last summer, there was no international crisis in Venezuela. Then, as the Epstein rebellion within the MAGA movement began, President Trump began initiating a new international crisis, one that involved amassing a gigantic military armada off the Venezuelan coast. Immediately, the MAGA rebellion dissipated, as MAGA members, predictably, patriotically and loyally rallied to the flag of Trump, the Pentagon, and the CIA.

It soon became obvious to most everyone that Trump, the Pentagon, and the CIA were about to initiate one of the national-security establishment’s patented regime-change operations, one that would violently oust the Chavista regime from power and replace it with the dissident, anti-Chavista movement within Venezuela. In my opinion, that regime-change would not have been a difficult military operation.

Everyone in Venezuela knows that Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro lost the last presidential election. The only reason he is still in power is that the national-security branch of the Venezuelan government has remained loyal to him. Given the power of the military-intelligence establishment and laws prohibiting private ownership of guns, there was no way for the Venezuelan people to rebel and oust the Maduro regime through force, at least not in the short term. When people began openly protesting, they were quickly rounded up, taken into custody, incarcerated, and tortured. Dissidents, not surprisingly, went into hiding and stopped openly protesting. The Venezuelan people learned the hard way why a national-security state form of government is so dangerous.

But rather than figure out ways to regain their freedom and independence, unfortunately many of the dissidents began looking to President Trump to be their daddy— to come to their assistance and to use the overwhelming might of the U.S. military to do their work for them. When Trump began amassing that huge military armada near Venezuela, they were certain that that was precisely what was going to happen.

But much to everyone’s surprise, that’s not what has happened. Instead, Trump limited his military escapade to a violent raid that left dozens of people dead and Maduro and his wife abducted and renditioned to the United States to stand trial for supposedly violating U.S. drug laws and U.S. gun laws while living and working entirely in Venezuela.

In the process, Trump has made it clear that he is knowingly and intentionally supporting the continuation of the brutal Chavista regime, with Madura’s appointed (i.e., not elected) vice-president Delcy Rodriguez, now heading the government — so long as she complies with Trump’s orders to pay what amounts to imperial tribute in the form of oil to him and the U.S. government.

What about the anti-Chavista dissidents? Trump has dissed them. In fact, he publicly  insulted and demeaned Maria Corina Machado, the leader of the dissidents, by stating that she did not have much respect among the Venezuelan people and, therefore, was incapable of serving as president of the country.

At first blush, Trump is flagrantly wrong. Machado has long been at the forefront of respected figures in Venezuela. In fact, the reason that Maduro barred her from running for president against him was because he knew that she would easily and overwhelmingly win the election.

But Trump does have a point: Undoubtedly, Machado has lost a lot of respect among the Venezuelan people for several unfortunate actions she has taken:

1. Machado has supported the brutal U.S. sanctions that the U.S. government has long imposed and enforced against the Venezuelan people. Its those sanctions, combined with Chavista socialism, that brought deep economic suffering to the Venezuelan people, causing millions of them to flee the country to avoid dying by starvation and illness.

2. Machado has declined to condemn the Trump regime’s brutal and tyrannical treatment of Venezuelan immigrants who have come to the United States to save their lives from the economic chaos brought on by the U.S. sanctions. That grave mistreatment includes forced deportation to Venezuela, knowing that death awaits them there, and also their forced, illegal rendition to El Salvador knowing that torture and indefinite detention awaited them.

3. Machado has engaged in embarrassing and shameful sycophantic support of Trump, both before and after his rejection and insult of her — praising, glorifying, and thanking him.

While Machado has never openly called for a violent U.S. regime-change intervention, she has also never openly opposed such an action. What she (and her supporters) should have done at her Nobel Prize presentation was declare to Trump, the Pentagon, and the CIA: “Butt out of Venezuelan affairs!” But that’s not what she (and they) did.  One gets the distinct impression that she was coyly not calling for a U.S. regime-change operation but secretly hoping and fully expecting that Trump would do it, especially after he amassed that giant military armada in the Caribbean.

The same holds true for many of her supporters, including libertarians. Many of them declined to openly support a violent military regime-change operation because that might have seemed unseemly, even for a “liberventionist.” But like Machado, many of them were undoubtedly secretly hoping and fully expecting a full regime-change operation, one that would place Machado into power.

What do Machado and her supporters, including her libertarian supporters, now do, given that Trump has obviously rejected her and dissed the dissidents in favor of the Chavista regime? She has resorted to continuing her sycophantic support of Trump. Of course, she no doubt realizes that if she criticizes him for not going full regime-change, she will be revealing that she was secretly supporting such an action the entire time. Moreover, she knows that Trump would go after her with a vengeance if she began criticizing him. Finally, she no doubt is still hoping that Trump will change his mind and initiate a full-blown regime-change operation.

The same holds true for Machado’s supporters, including the libertarian ones. What do they do now? Will they criticize Trump for supporting the horrific tyranny of the Chavista regime? I don’t think so. Do they simply settle for thanking Trump for abducting and renditioning Maduro and his wife for supposedly violating U.S. drug laws and gun laws, as Machado has done?  I think they will remain silent, secretly hoping, like Machado, that Trump “comes to his senses” and changes his mind.

Meanwhile, the Chavista regime, headed by Delcy Rodriguez and the Venezuela national-security establishment, is cracking down on dissent ever more fiercely than before Maduro’s removal from power. The regime has established road checkpoints and roving patrols involving masked men, where people are being subjected to stops, warrantless searches of persons, vehicles, and cell phones, and where government personnel are fully prepared to kill anyone who gets in their way. (All that should sound familiar, especially to Americans who live in Minnesota.)

Venezuelans, who are living under greater fear than ever, should not be surprised that the U.S. government has chosen oil over their freedom and well-being. As we have seen from the beginning with the sanctions against the Venezuelan people, the brutal and horrific mistreatment of Venezuelan immigrants and refugees, the killing of defenseless Venezuelans in those little boats, and the indifference to the killings of Venezuelans in the effort to abduct Maduro, in the eyes of U.S. officials the Venezuelan people are nothing but scum, no different from the Iraqi people, the Afghan people, the Iranian people, the Vietnamese people, the Korean people, and others. President Trump’s actions in support of the brutal, socialist Chavista regime, in exchange for oil, should surprise no one. It also helps explain why so many foreigners hate the United States.