Six Americans who had been detained in Venezuela in recent months have been released by the government of President Nicolás Maduro after having met a Trump administration manager on Friday Responsible for exhorting the authoritarian chief to repel the expelled migrants who have committed crimes in the United States.
President Trump and his envoy for special missions, Richard Grenell, announced the release of the six men on social networks. Grenell’s visit was a shock for many Venezuelans who hoped that Mr. Trump would continue the “maximum pressure” campaign he pursued against Maduro during his first mandate.
Grenell later Published a photo of six Americans aboard a flight returned to the United States
According to the White House, from Grenell to Venezuela de Grenell to Venezuela focused on Mr. Trump’s efforts to expel the Venezuelans in their country of origin, who do not currently accept them and on the release of the Americans detained.
“We are wheels and get home with these 6 American citizens”, ” Grenell posted on x With a photo showing it as well as the men aboard an airplane. “They just talked to @realdonaldtrump and they couldn’t stop thank him.”
Presidential Press Office of Venezuela, via AP
The meeting of the capital of Venezuela took place less than a month after Maduro was sworn in for a third term of six years despite credible evidence that he lost last year’s elections. The US government, as well as several other Western nations, do not recognize Maduro’s claim to victory and rather points to the counts collected by the coalition of the opposition showing that its candidate, Edmundo González, won by a margin of more than two to one.
Venezuelan state television broadcast images from Grenell and Maduro speaking in the Miraflore palace and said the meeting was requested by the United States government.
Signing an executive decree in the oval office on Friday, Trump was invited to know if Grenell was filmed by meeting Maduro lent legitimacy to an administration that Trump’s White House did not officially recognize.
“No. We want to do something with Venezuela. I was a very big opponent in Venezuela and Maduro,” replied Trump. “They treated not so good, but they treated the Venezuelan people very badly . “
Trump added that Grenell “meets many different people, but we are for the inhabitants of Venezuela”.
Some Republicans have criticized the visit.
“It’s a terrible timing,” said Elliott Abrams, who was a special sent to Venezuela and Iran during the first Trump administration. “A meeting with Maduro will be used by him to legitimize his reign and show that the Americans recognize him as president. If the goal is to transmit a difficult message on migration problems, the president could have done it himself. It was not necessary to send someone to Caracas. »»
The dispute over election results have triggered manifestations nationwide. More than 2,200 people were arrested during and after the demonstrations.
Among the detained persons are up to 10 Americans that the government has linked to alleged conspiracies to destabilize the country. Neither the White House nor the Maduro government immediately released the names of the six that were released on Friday.
A non -profit group that had argued for the release of an inmate said that David Estrella, a 62 -year -old child who was heard for the last time in September, was one of the people on the way to the United States Minister of the ‘Venezuelan interior, Diosdado Cabello, had accused Estrella of being part of an alleged plot to assassinate Maduro.
The Trump administration has taken a series of measures to make promises to reprimand illegal immigration and make the greatest mass deportation effort in American history.
These measures include the revocation earlier this week from an administration decision of Biden which would have protected around 600,000 people from Venezuela from the expulsion, which may be removed from the country in about two months.
The white house press secretary Karoline Leavitt told journalists on Friday that Trump had asked Greneng to “identify a place and ensure that repatriation flights” carrying the Venezuelans, including the members of The criminal organization of Tren de Aragua, “Land in Venezuela”. She said Trump also ordered Greneng to “make sure all American detainees in Venezuela have returned home”.
More than 7.7 million Venezuelans have left their country of origin since 2013, when its economy collapsed and Maduro took office. The most installed in Latin America and the Caribbean, but after the pandemic, migrants have grown more and more the scope of the United States
The desire of the Venezuelans for better living conditions and their rejection of Maduro should continue to push people to emigrate.
Before the presidential election last year, a national survey of the search firm based in Venezuela Delphos showed about a quarter of the population, thinking of emigrating it if Maduro was re -elected.
Grenell has already contacted Maduro on behalf of Mr. Trump to guarantee the release of the Americans imprisoned to go home.
In 2020, he traveled with Erik Prince, the founder of the controversial security company Blackwater, in Mexico City for a secret meeting with better help from Maduro. Backchannel talks were focused on Maduro’s offer to exchange eight Americans, then were imprisoned in Venezuela for the businessman Alex Saab, a close ally of the President accused in the United States of money laundering , reported the Associated Press.
No agreement was concluded and Grenell’s request that Maduro resigned was rejected by the envoy of the Venezuelan president. Grenell has always denied having negotiated an exchange of hostages.
Later, in December 2023, the Biden administration exchanged the SAAB for 10 Americans as part of a Maduro re -engagement policy before the presidential elections.