To understand what is happening in Venezuela you have to know the main protagonists. Lawyer Eva Golinger (New York, 1973) has treated them. She lived with them, as a lawyer and international advisor and journalist, during the presidency of Hugo Chávez, who won the elections of December 5, 1998 with 56.5% of the votes, and also later, when Nicolás Maduro became president after the death of Chávez, on March 5, 2013. El Periódico had a wide-ranging conversation with the author of several books about Chávez and Venezuela via telematics this Tuesday, March 6. January. Here are its essential sections.
Question: Could the documentary film that Donald Trump produced, 3F2026, be made without anyone from the Bolivarian government knowing that it was being filmed?
Answer: No. There was a betrayal. Or several. The government of Venezuela is not a homogeneous body. It is made up of different groups and people who share power. And they control different areas of the apparatus: security, military, people, groups, institutions, judiciary, oil industry, business.
Q: Is Delcy Rodríguez part of one of those groups?
A: Delcy and his brother Jorge Rodríguez, president of the National Assembly, is one of them. My information is that Jorge and Delcy Rodríguez are now taking power through a meticulous negotiation with the Trump Administration. His brother Jorge has been the main protagonist behind the scenes. It’s an evil negotiation, I would say, citing the famous video game, that has been going on for months.
Q: On October 16, 2025, the Miami New Herald newspaper reported on that negotiation, citing the Rodríguez brothers. By the way, she uploaded a photo of her and Maduro on Instagram with this message: “They have not been able to and will not be able to.” And what we have now is what the news said: “A madurismo without Maduro.”
A: Yes, I remember. But there was more information in that sense. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) followed in Maduro’s footsteps in Caracas. Only when you know how the Bolivarian movement operates do you know what its way of reasoning and calculating is.
Q: How do you calculate?
A: In my view, its main objective and interest, understood as power and accumulation of wealth, is to maintain power at any cost, including Maduro’s sacrifice. They represent a system, it is not just a government that assumes a government period.
Q: Is that why they didn’t give up the government after losing the 2024 presidential elections?
A: That’s it. Look, Venezuela’s electronic electoral system, I know because I was there when it was installed, is perfect. It is impossible, with the way voting is done and the various controls, to commit fraud. Maduro lost. That is why he could not show the minutes. And I suppose they have been destroyed. But I have to tell you that I don’t believe that Edmundo González won by such a difference. Why do I say it? Because María Corina Machado cheated with false signatures when a referendum was held during the Chávez era. Now it is Trump who has said that he has no respect or support. Well that.
Q: When did the idea that Delcy was in the race for “maturism without Maduro” click with you?
A: I was shocked one day last December. It was when I saw Delcy’s photo in The New York Times on December 5. I said wow. I remember that she was wearing a yellow Chanel jacket and an impeccable light blue shirt. She was a model. Delcy began to appear in the international press as moderate and the most pragmatic to make agreements.
Q: You know her. How is?
A: Very radical. Look where you are. Chávez had her as head of protocol and she lasted six months. For me, seeing that lobbying campaign was a sign. The New York Times did not feature her with those photos for speculative reasons. Once Maduro was out, come on, kidnapped, Delcy was inside.
Q: Delcy was on Friday, January 2, at Maduro’s reception for Qeiu Xiaqi, special envoy of the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, at the Miraflores presidential palace. But on Saturday the 3rd the Reuters agency reported at noon that he was in Moscow.
A: My news is that he returned very quickly and went to Margarita Island. Maybe the Russians helped in the negotiation. Delcy gets along very well with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov
Q: Did you have any information leaks?
A: I think they knew. Something was going to happen. Maybe not the details. The Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, held conversations with her. Now they will say that before January 3, as Trump has done, no. But you can’t believe them.
Q: And now what?
A: Delcy has sworn and the subsequent statement is very revealing. A day has passed since the bombing of Caracas. There have been 100 deaths and the Delta Force has eliminated Maduro’s 32 Cuban bodyguards, who have resisted. But Delcy no longer calls for the release of Maduro or Cilia Flores. It says: “We invite the US government to collaborate with us on a cooperation agenda…”. That is to say: there will be a delegation of executives from multinational oil companies to reach lucrative agreements, based on a legal modification of the statute of the state oil company PDVSA, given that Delcy already had oil among her functions as executive president. And if things don’t go bad, they can, because Army Minister-Captain Diosdado Cabello has ambitions, since he became president for a few hours, in 2002, when Chávez was ousted by a coup d’état and imprisoned on the Venezuelan island of La Orchila. It was he who sent a group of the Navy to rescue the deposed president.
Q: If human and civil rights have been degraded, as is evident, in the United States under Trump, it is not difficult to see how the issue of democracy and elections is of no interest to his plans in Venezuela.
A: I practice as a lawyer and I can tell you that it is a dramatic situation with the immigration police, to speak of one of the big issues. Trump has no interest in elections in Venezuela. They will try to postpone them as long as they can. There may be resistance. The old Chavismo that remains and the left can mobilize, since the betrayal has been evident. Maduro had promised resistance. Millions of Venezuelans would stop US aggression. None of that has happened.
Q: Is Maduro a drug trafficker?
A: He doesn’t think so. That there are some in your government who have trafficked drugs, that is very possible. But in New York they have Hugo “El Pollo” Carvajal, the former spy chief of the Venezuelan government. He will say anything to condemn Maduro in exchange for what he gets from Trump.
Subscribe to continue reading
