María Corina Machado will return to Venezuela within a few weeks, she announced Sunday, as the Venezuelan opposition leader seeks a role in her country’s democratic transition.
Machado made her first public appearance in nearly a year in December, emerging from hiding to accept her Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo. She later presented President Donald Trump with the prize during a meeting at the White House in January as a token of her appreciation for his support, despite the Nobel committee saying the prize could not be transferred.
“The world now knows: the transition to democracy in Venezuela is unstoppable,” she said in a video posted to social media in Spanish. “For years we said this regime would only relinquish power when confronted with real force and a credible threat. First, we had to defeat them spiritually, then politically, then electorally, and finally, militarily. We said it would happen, and it happened.”
Machado has repeatedly courted Trump’s support for her opposition movement as his administration works with acting President Delcy Rodríguez, the former vice president and a close ally of ousted leader Nicolás Maduro. But Machado’s chances of being installed as the country’s leader have dwindled in recent months, with the White House growing increasingly frustrated with her rhetoric.
Machado told POLITICO in an exclusive interview last month that Venezuela could hold new democratic elections in less than a year, a prediction that rankled administration allies who worried her remarks could undercut the White House’s workplan in Venezuela.
In that interview, Machado told POLITICO she hoped to return to her country “as soon as possible,” adding that “the time will come” for her to help Venezuela prepare for a democratic transition.
“Every area of my life I’ve asked, you know, all these years, where am I more useful to our cause?” she said. “And it got to a point in Venezuela after 16 months when I realized I had to do some things abroad, something that I had not wanted to do because I thought it was, and I still think it is, important to be close to our people.”
Machado has attempted to walk a fine line in her public remarks, praising the Trump administration for its role in capturing Maduro while also consistently criticizing Rodriguez and the Maduro allies who remain in power.
Machado won the primary to be the opposition party’s candidate in Venezuela’s 2024 presidential election but was barred from running by the Maduro regime. Maduro ultimately claimed a third term after opposition figure Edmundo González replaced Machado on the ticket, although independent watchdogs deemed the election unfair and questioned the credibility of official results.
“The regime that is in Venezuela today has the same nature; they are the ones who have tortured, persecuted, imprisoned, disappeared, murdered, expropriated and lied,” Machado said in the video. “They want to buy time so that nothing changes. But everything changed. And now, they must follow instructions to move forward with the dismantling of the repression, the economic recovery of our country, and advance towards the transition.”
