Venezuela’s acting president adapts to post-Maduro reality and signals a new era of US ties

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez used her first state of the union message on Thursday to advocate for opening the crucial state-run oil industry to more foreign investment following the Trump administration’s pledge to seize control of Venezuelan crude sales.

For the first time, Rodríguez laid out a vision for Venezuela’s new political reality — one that challenges her government’s most deeply rooted beliefs less than two weeks after the United States captured and toppled former President Nicolás Maduro.

Under pressure from the U.S. to cooperate with its plans for reshaping Venezuela’s sanctioned oil industry, Maduro’s former vice president declared that a “new policy is being formed in Venezuela.”

She urged the foreign diplomats in attendance to tell investors abroad about the changes and called on lawmakers to approve oil sector reforms that would secure foreign firms’ access to Venezuela’s vast reserves.

“Venezuela, in free trade relations with the world, can sell the products of its energy industry,” she said.

The Trump administration has said it plans to control future oil export revenues to ensure it benefits the Venezuelan people.

In that vein, Rodríguez, wearing a bright green pantsuit, described cash from the oil sales flowing into two sovereign wealth funds, one to support crisis-stricken health services and another to bolster public infrastructure, much of which was built under Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chávez, and has since deteriorated.

These days the country’s hospitals are so poorly equipped that patients are asked to provide supplies needed for their care, from syringes to surgical screws.

While Rodríguez criticized the U.S. capture of Maduro and referred to a “stain on our relations,” she also promoted the resumption of diplomacy between the historic adversaries. Her succinct, 44-minute speech and mollifying tone marked a dramatic contrast to her predecessors’ fiery rants against U.S. imperialism that often went on for hours.

“Let us not be afraid of diplomacy,” Rodriguez. “I ask that politics not be transformed, that it not begin with hatred and intolerance.”

The day before, she gave a 4-minute briefing to the media to say her government would continue releasing prisoners detained under Maduro’s harsh rule. But human rights groups have verified just a fraction of the releases that she claimed took place.

Rodríguez appears to be threading a needle.

A portrait of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, was displayed next to her as she spoke. She called for the U.S. government to “respect the dignity” of Maduro, who is being held in a Brooklyn jail after pleading not guilty to drug-trafficking charges. She portrayed herself as defending Venezuela’s sovereignty even as the country warmed up to the U.S. with dizzying speed.

“If one day, as acting president, I have to go to Washington, I will do so standing up, walking, not being dragged,” she said. “I’ll go standing tall … never crawling.”

Rodríguez delivered her speech as Venezuela’s Nobel Prize-winning opposition leader María Corina Machado was the one in Washington to meet President Donald Trump.

Since Maduro’s ouster, Trump has frozen Machado out of discussions about the nation’s political fate while embracing Rodríguez, praising Maduro’s long-time loyalist as a “terrific person” after holding his first known phone call with her on Wednesday.

Machado, whose party is considered to have won the tumultuous 2024 presidential elections despite Maduro’s claims of victory, said she presented her Nobel Peace Prize medal to Trump during their closed-door conversation.

Emerging from the White House afterward, she greeted dozens of cheering supporters. “We can count on President Trump,” she told them, without elaborating.

Her role in Venezuelan politics remains uncertain as Rodríguez’s government has been effectively relieved of having to hold elections for the foreseeable future.

Machado’s meeting with Trump received no coverage in Venezuela.

The country’s state-run TV still pumps out a steady stream of pro-government images, including various statements from Iranian and Russian officials decrying “U.S. aggression” and wall-to-wall coverage of state-orchestrated rallies demanding Maduro’s return.

Crowds of teachers on Thursday marched through the streets of Venezuela’s capital, Caracas, carrying posters condemning the U.S. for “kidnapping” Maduro and chanting slogans in support of the government. National police wearing riot gear were everywhere. Pro-government graffiti scrawled across city walls read: “To doubt is to betray.”

“They’ve kept the same anti-imperialist rhetoric going, but more moderated,” said David Smilde, a Venezuela expert at Tulane University who has studied Venezuela for 30 years. “Their idea is to give Trump everything he wants economically, but stay the course politically.”

On the streets of central Caracas, most Venezuelans going about their days declined to be interviewed about their opinions, fearful of government reprisals as Maduro’s security apparatus remains intact. Others were simply at a loss of what to say about their country’s strange new reality in which the U.S. claims to call the shots.

“It’s a complete sea of ​​uncertainty, and the only one who now has the power to make decisions is the United States government,” said Pablo Rojas, 28, a music producer.

He said he was following Trump’s meeting with Machado closely “to see if she takes a leadership position, if they consider her ready to lead the country or be a candidate.” He shook his head in puzzlement. “It’s impossible to know what will happen.”

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Associated Press writers Isabel DeBre in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and Megan Janetsky in Mexico City contributed to this report.

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