- How would anybody invest in a country that is absolutely in the last place in terms of rule of law?

I'm talking literally the last place.

Would you lend to a country on that condition?

Would you invest?

Would you come back and leave?

Of course not.

(gentle music) - Hello, and welcome to "GZERO World."

I'm Ian Bremmer, and today I am talking with the most prominent opposition leader in Venezuela.

It's worth noting that she remains inside Venezuela, though very much in hiding at a time when virtually every major Venezuelan opposition figure has been jailed or exiled.

In January, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro was inaugurated for a third term, despite widespread allegations of fraud and condemnation from the United States and Europe and others.

This is an American story, too.

The Biden era saw an unprecedented influx of Venezuelan migrants to sanctuary cities.

And under President Trump's administration so far, thousands of Venezuelans have been arrested, many already deported.

Some of them, purported gang members, shipped off to a black hole of a prison in El Salvador.

And in recent weeks, President Trump has canceled Venezuelan oil licenses and threatened steep sanctions on Maduro's regime.

Those are moves that my guest today, Maria Corina Machado, very much supports.

We'll get into all that and mas, mucho mas.

Don't worry, I've also got your "Puppet Regime."

- People weren't exactly thrilled with Liberation Day.

They didn't realize it was about tariffs and not barbecues.

- But first, a word from the folks who help us keep the lights on.

- [Narrator 1] Funding for "GZERO World" is provided by our lead sponsor, Prologis.

- [Narrator 2] Every day all over the world, Prologis helps businesses of all sizes lower their carbon footprint and scale their supply chains with a portfolio of logistics and real estate and an end-to-end solutions platform addressing the critical initiatives of global logistics today.

Learn more at prologis.com - [Narrator 1] And by... Cox Enterprises is proud to support "GZERO."

Cox is working to create an impact in areas like sustainable agriculture, clean tech, healthcare, and more.

Cox, a family of businesses.

Additional funding provided by Jerre and Mary Joy Stead, Carnegie Corporation of New York, and... (bright music) (soft jazz music) - [Ian] In late February, Donald Trump Jr. welcomed Maria Corina Machado, Venezuela's defacto opposition leader, onto his podcast, "Triggered."

It was an unusual choice for a show that tends to feature far-right American firebrands, like Steve Bannon, Charlie Kirk.

Don Jr. quickly brought things back to a more familiar footing.

- Maria, you've been completely censored in your own country, something that so many Americans, certainly on my side of the political spectrum, have had to deal with over here.

Do you see parallels to what my father had to endure in the last election to what they're doing to you?

- Oh, certainly.

And I see it in many places around the world.

But believe me, I've never seen what is going on and happened here.

You know?

- Donald Trump Jr. was trying to frame Machado's experience within a familiar American narrative of MAGA persecution.

No surprise there.

But I did find it interesting that Machado more or less went along with that framing.

So, how did the woman who has revitalized Venezuela's opposition, who has drawn massive crowds to protest Maduro's reelection, and who has gone into hiding somewhere in Venezuela find herself smiling and nodding on Donald Trump Jr.'s podcast?

To answer that, we have to turn back the clock.

(gentle music) Caracas-born and an engineer by training, Machado burst onto Venezuela's political scene in 2011.

Then a fringe opposition politician, she interrupted President Hugo Chavez's annual address to Congress and accused him of, quote, "Robbing the private sector."

(Machado speaks foreign language) - [Ian] Chavez dismissed her outburst, responding irritably, the quote, "An eagle doesn't hunt a fly."

But in the many years since, that fly has kept on buzzing long past Chavez's own death in 2013 and throughout the 12 years of increasingly authoritarian rule under his handpicked successor, Nicolas Maduro.

Under Maduro, Venezuela's economy has cratered and millions of Venezuelans have fled to neighboring countries, as well as the United States.

Fast-forward to August 2024, past a carousel of failed or exiled opposition leaders, and Machado leads a massive protest in the heart of Caracas.

(Machado speaks foreign language) - Days earlier, Venezuela's regime-friendly electoral council had proclaimed Nicolas Maduro the winner of a third term, despite widespread allegations of fraud.

In fact, shortly after the results were announced, the opposition published tallies from 80% of voting machines that showed their candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, winning handily.

As a side note, Gonzalez had replaced Machado on the ticket months earlier after the Maduro regime banned her from running.

Machado soon went into hiding, where she remains today, and Maduro was inaugurated last January.

But she hasn't kept quiet.

Through remote interviews and media outreach, Machado's rallied support for the opposition and praised right-leaning Latin American leaders, like Argentina's Javier Milei and El Salvador's Nayib Bukele.

And she has defended the Trump administration's recent move to cancel oil and gas licenses that had allowed energy companies to operate in Venezuela.

And that brings me back to her interview with Don Trump Jr. As the president's son kept turning the conversation back to criticizing Biden and praising his father, Machado offered vague and non-committal signs of agreement.

Then she would pivot to requesting additional US support to end Maduro's rule.

And it's a useful indicator of how Machado may try to work with the Trump administration whose Venezuela policy remains pretty murky as she tries to bring about regime change in her own country.

And while a US military intervention in Venezuela remains highly unlikely, there are signs that her messaging may be working.

Late last month, President Trump threatened 25% tariffs on any country that buys Venezuelan oil, and that could be a potent hit against China, which imports more Venezuelan oil than any other country, just one more sign that Trump's increasingly hostile stance towards Venezuela goes well beyond the petrostate's borders.

Joining me now to discuss Venezuela's future is the opposition leader herself, Maria Corina Machado.

Maria Corina Machado, welcome to "GZERO World."

- Thank you very much.

It's my pleasure.

- I know that you can't tell me exactly where you are right now, but you are in Venezuela in hiding as befits the situation.

Tell me what life is like in Venezuela for the average person today.

- Well, life in Venezuela is getting tougher and tougher by the day.

The regime, as you know, has lost all popular support.

The economic and social crisis has been deteriorating dramatically in the last months.

It's simply not only a conventional dictatorship, it goes beyond.

I mean, this is a criminal structure that has decided to rob and sack the country to stay in power.

And since they were defeated by a landslide under their own unfair rules in the presidential election last July 28th, the regime has unleashed the worst repression wave we've ever seen, with more than 2000 people in prison, including children and women, several, tens of Venezuelans tortured and disappeared.

And actually, everybody that speaks out to tell the truth is immediately accused of terrorism and sent to jail.

That's why I am in hiding right now.

- How safe is it for you to actually stay in the country going forward?

- Well, Maduro has been very clear.

He said I should be in prison for life.

He has threatened all my teams and colleagues.

They are either in prison or in hiding, or in exile, or under asylum.

They have gone also against our families, you know, pressuring, threatening.

And as I say, I've been accused of every single criminal crime you can think of, just because we were able to defeat the regime and prove our victory.

And we are never going to give up on the country.

We are organizing, even though in hiding and with security measures, all our teams around the country, because we will go until the end.

And that means Maduro will have to leave power and we will advance in a transition to democracy.

We're not giving up.

- I appreciate your courageousness.

He's, of course, managed to achieve a third term in power, even though everyone, the Americans, the Europeans, others around the world have said that there were enormous irregularities.

It wasn't in any way a free and fair election.

He stole the outcome.

Why do you believe...

I mean, you've argued that his control is more tenuous than ever.

For someone that doesn't spend much time focusing on Venezuela, it might look like, actually, his control is stronger than ever, that he's like Putin or he's like Xi Jinping, or any of these other leaders that refuse to have normal elections.

Why do you think he's weak?

- Well, actually, that's what the regime needs to portray.

They need the world to think that they're stronger, when, in fact, it's quite the opposite.

It's not just that we won an election by, you know, a small margin.

I mean, this was 70/30 under conditions that you would have never accepted to compete in the first moment, because we all knew that this was absolutely controlled by the regime, but they were surprised by the kind of organization, mobilization that we put in place.

Not only we won by a 40-point margin, percentile margin, but we proved our victory for the first time ever with the official tally sheets demonstrating our result.

And the response from the regime, Ian, was never to publish one single number.

They just decided Maduro stays by force.

And what effect did this have?

That even Maduro's previous allies, international allies, have not recognized that he won anything, because he lost and everybody knows it.

So he's completely isolated internationally.

Who used to be Maduro's support?

Syria.

Where is it right now, the regime?

Russia, Iran, Cuba, Hezbollah.

I mean, these were the kinds of allies Maduro was counting on a few months ago.

Secondly, you know, the social pressure.

And as I mentioned before, the collapse of our economy has grown in a very accelerated pace, and this obviously also reflects on what used to be Maduro's support, the military and the police.

I can tell you that mid-ranks to low ranks all want, desperately, a political change as much as we do.

And you can see that also in the kinds of tensions and fractures that are taking place among the different criminal groups that conform the regime.

And finally, I have to say, recent decisions by President Trump in terms of addressing the regime as a criminal structure with a law enforcement approach is something that has brought huge concern among those that still support Maduro because they know that the resources into this criminal structure will be reduced significantly.

And this creates, as I mentioned before, concentration among these criminal structures.

- The Trump administration, with some notable hawks on Venezuela, like in particular, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, we've seen an effort to put more pressure on Venezuela.

Are you happy with what you've seen from the Trump administration on your country so far?

And what else do you think they should be doing?

- Well, I think things are moving in the right direction.

I think much more should be done.

First of all, because as I said before, this is not a conventional dictatorship.

Venezuela has been turned into the criminal hub of the Americas.

I mean, a safe haven for cartels, guerrillas, networks of smuggling, even women and children being used for these networks of prostitution.

This is dramatic.

I mean the gold smuggling and the presence even of terrorist agents.

So I do think Venezuela is a threat to the security of the Western Hemisphere and should be addressed as such, as I said, with a law enforcement approach.

So every criminal organization grows and maintains its activities as long as they get resources, the flows of money.

If these flows are reduced, then these structures start to fight between them and fracture.

And that's precisely what's starting to happen right now after these licenses were revoked.

And the point here is that Maduro need to understand that this is not sustainable, that the world won't look the other way around because they have committed crimes against humanity and that we, the Venezuelan people, won't stop fighting.

So I do think the international community can do a lot more.

I speak about Europe and other countries, even in Latin America, in terms of raising the cost of repression so that those that today torture, disappear, and kill Venezuelans get it very clear that they will be held accountable, and give incentives so that we increase the cost of staying in power by force, but also give incentives for a peaceful and orderly transition, and that's where we should move forward.

- So we know that thousands and thousands of Venezuelans have come into the United States illegally, nowhere close to the numbers that Colombia has been dealing with, but still significant illegal migration problem.

Hundreds of those Venezuelans have now been deported and sent to some of the most notorious prisons in the world in El Salvador.

And there are reports that not all of those that have been deported are actually gang members.

I'm wondering how you feel about that deportation process.

Is this an appropriate decision to be made with Venezuelan citizens by the United States?

- Well, this is a very complex process.

And as you say, of course, we are concerned for every Venezuelan abroad.

I have to say that almost the totality of Venezuelans that have left are good, hardworking people.

But certainly there are a group that has been used by the regime, intentionally sent abroad to create destabilization in the region.

The other side of this story, or this drama, I would say, Ian, is that many of those that are being sent to Venezuela that are linked to the regime and that are criminals are immediately integrated to the regime repression structures.

So, you know, sending them back to Venezuela means that they're going to either re-establish their crimes here and repress Venezuelan citizens or are going to be sent back abroad.

So those criminals that are proven to have, you know, linked to this criminal network, such as Tren de Aragua, who is linked to Maduro and who receives orders from Maduro, I believe should not be sent back to Venezuela at this moment.

- Despite the fact that Venezuela is increasingly isolated and very few countries recognized this new government, they are continuing to get a lot of support from China, which is willing to buy a lot of oil from Venezuela.

They're continuing to get a lot of support from Russia, which President Trump is more interested in re-establishing relations.

You know, when you look at the rest of the world, you're not seeing a move towards strengthening democracy.

You're seeing a move towards authoritarian regimes doing better and democracies getting weaker.

Tell me why Venezuela is gonna be the exception to that.

- Not only the exception, the example.

I think what we did last year when everybody told me it was impossible to bring back a country together on our feet when we had been, you know, so demoralized and divided by the regime, and we were able to, you know, go all around the country and create this legion of over one million citizens, volunteers, because we understood that the only way we could have our children coming back home, the only way we could live with dignity and justice and prosperity was, you know, overcoming this tyranny and creating the democratic institutions for renewal of Venezuela.

We are convinced we're gonna turn Venezuela from the criminal hub of the Americas into the energy hub of Americas, bringing not only opportunities and jobs for the Venezuelan people, but huge, immense, unique opportunities for investment from international business that will not find any other opportunity in this hemisphere as Venezuela represents.

- So China, of course, has been historically a big consumer of Venezuelan exports.

Not so much anymore.

Talk to me a little bit about why that is and why Americans don't need to worry that the Chinese are gonna take advantage of the US squeezing Venezuela harder.

- In Venezuela, in the year 2016, China was producing around 70,000 barrels a day.

Today, that has been decreasing to less than 40 a day.

China is not interested in investing in Venezuela because it was one of the worst financial decisions to give huge loans to the regime that they have not paid so far.

China does not want to deal with a profoundly corrupt, inept tyranny such as Maduro.

They know him very well.

- It's funny, I meet so many Venezuelans when I'm up in Canada, because the geology of the oil patch is very similar.

And I gotta tell you, you know, it's a lot colder for the Venezuelans up there, but they understand that there's no business for them to do, there's no work for them in your country.

- How would anybody invest in a country that is absolutely in the last place in terms of rule of law by the World Justice Project?

I'm talking literally the last place out of 140 countries that are evaluated around the world.

Venezuela is in the last place.

So, would you lend to a country in that condition?

Would you invest?

Would you come back and live?

Of course not.

And that's why Venezuela is in this desperate situation, being the country that has the biggest oil reserves in the world and the eighth in terms of gas reserves in the world.

So this is a huge opportunity waiting to be opened, and that's precisely what we are going to do.

So we have to align the interests and incentives of all stakeholders, those that want to do business and those that want security for the hemisphere, and certainly those that care about human rights and the humanitarian crisis.

I want you to know and the world to know that we are ready.

We have our teams with high-qualified professionals in every sector, those that are here, those that are working abroad.

We know what we have to do the first 100 days to make sure that we can guarantee security, basic services.

We will care for those populations which are more vulnerable, and certainly we will open markets, so that Venezuela can prosper and take advantage of the huge natural resources that we have.

And that will not be developed under, you know, communism, crime, and dictatorship, but you require an open market and a serious government with strong democratic institutions.

- Maria Corina Machado, thank you, and stay safe.

- Thank you very much.

My pleasure.

(gentle music) - And now I've got your "Puppet Regime."

(birds chirp) - All right, Elon, people weren't exactly thrilled with Liberation Day.

They didn't realize it was about tariffs and not barbecues.

What else can we liberate them from very strongly to make them happy?

- How about Arabic numerals?

- Like a new Muslim ban.

Okay, what do we replace it with?

- I was thinking Roman numerals.

- Very clever.

That's gonna do a lot for X.

- Totally.

Plus, then everyone will be thinking about the Roman Empire all the time.

- Not just the weirdos who love you and never had a girlfriend before?

- Hey!

- I like it.

Let's think what else we can liberate ourselves from very strongly.

How about exit signs?

- Exit signs?

- Exit signs.

No more exit signs.

The radical left nanny state ends now.

- Yes, and all those federal workers can find their own freaking way out.

- Yes.

- Yes.

- Yes.

- (chuckles) This is so great.

- Again, so liberating.

Could do this all day.

- Totally.

Hey, speaking of which, maybe you could, like, liberate the Oval Office for a couple of days and just kind of let me... ♪ Puppet Regime ♪ - That's our show this week.

Come back next week.

And if you like what you've seen, or even if you don't, but you wanna start your own opposition party, check us out at gzeromedia.com.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (bright music) - [Narrator 1] Funding for "GZERO World" is provided by our lead sponsor, Prologis.

- [Narrator 2] Every day all over the world, Prologis helps businesses of all sizes lower their carbon footprint and scale their supply chains with a portfolio of logistics and real estate and an end-to-end solutions platform, addressing the critical initiatives of global logistics today.

Learn more at prologis.com.

- [Narrator 1] And by... Cox Enterprises is proud to support "GZERO."

Cox is working to create an impact in areas like sustainable agriculture, clean tech, healthcare, and more.

Cox, a family of businesses.

Additional funding provided by Jerre and Mary Joy Stead, Carnegie Corporation of New York, and... (bright music) (cheerful music)