Despite Venezuelans overwhelmingly voting for the opposition in the country’s 2024 elections and the United States recognizing the winner as the legitimate president-elect, Maduro’s removal has so far failed to set in motion the change in government for which Venezuelans voted. Instead, the same repressive security forces, political operatives, and armed colectivos that sustained the previous regime are still operating, now with American-sanctioned impunity. By recognizing Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s vice president, as the interim leader of Venezuela, the Trump administration has effectively swapped one indicted autocrat for another—this time, one acceptable to U.S. business interests.
At the center of the military intervention without a plan for democratic transition is Secretary of State and national security adviser Marco Rubio. The administration’s head diplomat—whose confirmation in the Senate was unanimous—has rejected his proud past as a champion of democracy and human rights to become the architect of a transactional strategy that prioritizes corporate oil interests over freedom for the Venezuelan people.
Rubio backtracks on his support for the Venezuelan people
During his time serving on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Rubio was the strongest congressional Republican champion of democracy and human rights in Latin America, particularly for countries facing authoritarian repression. In 2017, he co-sponsored bipartisan legislation with then-Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD) to support Venezuelans facing brutal repression under Maduro, calling for humanitarian assistance, strategic engagement with regional partners through the Organization of American States, and support for democracy restoration and future electoral observation missions. In introducing the legislation, Rubio said, “The United States must stand with and support the Venezuelan people as they struggle to defend their rights and restore constitutional mechanisms.” Rubio was also a vocal advocate for expanding Temporary Protected Status (TPS) to Venezuelans who had fled the humanitarian crisis in their country, becoming the only Republican to co-sponsor the Venezuela TPS Act. During the Biden administration, he applauded the designation of TPS for Venezuelans, and a year later, citing violence on the ground, called for an extension of the protected status.
However, upon becoming secretary of state, that commitment vanished as he played a central role in the White House immigration crackdown. In a stunning reversal, he requested the termination of TPS for 600,000 Venezuelans in a letter to the Department of Homeland Security, claiming it was no longer in the national interest of the United States. He then struck a deal with El Salvador President Nayib Bukele to send hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center (Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo, or CECOT), a high-security prison, where many were subjected to abuse such as torture and sexual violence, according to a Human Rights Watch report. The proud Senate champion for Venezuelan refugees subjected to political persecution and economic displacement quickly abandoned them to advance his political fortunes under Trump.
As a Florida senator, Rubio championed hardline tactics with the goal of bringing about political change in Venezuela; however, he is now a champion of the Rodríguez regime. During recent Senate testimony, Rubio defended this approach, stating that while Maduro was an “impediment to progress,” the United States now maintains a “respectful and productive line of communication” with Rodríguez. These tactics were previewed in the weeks leading up to the Venezuela intervention with the release of the United States’ “2025 National Security Strategy.” The new strategy lays claim to the Western Hemisphere as the United States’ “sphere of influence,” over which it has a right to exercise dominion. The strategy also explicitly omits human rights and democracy promotion as core values, making the absence of any democratic transition plan for Venezuela after the removal of Maduro less surprising, and reflects Rubio’s and the administration’s preference for power projection over real solutions for a democratic Venezuela and Latin America. Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) highlighted the real consequences of this strategy shift during Rubio’s hearing, calling the administration “complicit” in human rights violations for backing and providing resources to a regime that continues the “constant oppression” of its people while simultaneously threatening to deport refugees back to those same conditions. Rubio dismissed these concerns, justifying the termination of refugee protections as a necessary step to weed out potential unvetted “Venezuelan gang members,” despite the administration’s failure to demonstrate that deportees are gang members.
While Venezuela dominates the administration’s public messaging, it is not its only goal for the hemisphere. This resource grab in Venezuela is merely the first step in a broader strategy of signaling U.S. strength in the region ahead of the potential fall or forced ouster of the Cuban government. Rubio, the son of Cuban exiles, has long viewed Cuba as the ideological and logistical backbone of leftist governance in the hemisphere and a central threat to U.S. hegemony in the region. Since the January 3 operation ousting Maduro, Rubio has made no secret that he would like to see regime change come to Cuba, saying that the Cuban government should be at least a little concerned. Rubio and the administration’s strategy of choking off Cuban oil imports from Venezuela and finding a Delcy-like figure inside the Cuban government who will cut a deal to end the current regime could result in another autocrat—President Miguel Díaz-Canel—removed from office without a real plan for what comes next.
Sidelining democracy for oil
For years, Rubio was a supporter of democratic opposition figures in Venezuela, Nicaragua, and across Latin America. In 2024, he publicly backed María Corina Machado as the legitimate opposition leader in Venezuela, co-signing a letter praising her “courageous and selfless leadership” and calling her “an example to the world” in her fight for democracy against Maduro’s regime. Yet as the Trump administration realized the significant profits to be made from extraction of Venezuela’s resources, Rubio sidelined Machado and backed central regime figures he once condemned. Under the deal made with Rodríguez, the United States is initially seizing 30 million to 50 million barrels of crude oil, to be sold at market rates—and it is using the proceeds as leverage over Rodríguez. This leverage was made explicit during Rubio’s January 28 Senate testimony, where he warned that “Rodríguez is well aware of the fate of Maduro” and stated that the United States is “prepared to use force to ensure maximum cooperation” should she fail to advance the administration’s “key objectives.”
Rubio and the administration have attempted to dress up this pivot as a realistic assessment of the on-the-ground reality. However, by prioritizing oil cooperation and short-term stability over a true democratic transition, they have effectively legitimized the regime’s existing leadership. Rubio has even echoed Trump’s dismissive claims that Machado “doesn’t have the support … or respect” to lead the country by saying the “opposition is no longer present” in Venezuela.
The hollowness of Rubio’s justifications was evident in a January 2026 Meganálisis poll. The results reveal that while Rubio claims that the opposition has lost its relevance, 78 percent of Venezuelans say they would vote for Machado today. While more than 90 percent of Venezuelans are grateful for Maduro’s removal, a staggering 94 percent believe that regime holdovers such as Rodríguez should have no role in the transition.
Facing mounting opposition from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers, Rubio has attempted to quell demands for next steps by vaguely articulating a three-part plan for “stability, recovery, then transition.” Put together in less than a week after the January 3 operation, it is unlikely that Rubio’s plan to stabilize, rebuild, and politically reorient a nation of 28.5 million people will succeed. In reality, the plan will likely lead to the United States’ open-ended de facto control of Venezuela to protect future oil investments with the help of the remaining Maduro circle and no prospects for an election anytime soon.
Worse yet, the Trump administration’s dissolution of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), mass firing of career diplomats, and elimination of relevant expertise have hollowed out the U.S. government’s capacity to strengthen democratic institutions and build local capacity for rebuilding the economy.
Conclusion
Marco Rubio’s reversal on Venezuela, from defender of democratic opposition to broker of oil deals with regime insiders, has left the Venezuelan people’s future dangerously uncertain. Venezuelans who risked everything to vote for change in 2024 find themselves governed by the same regime, now operating with American approval in exchange for oil concessions. After decades of repression under Maduro, their future now depends on a U.S. stabilization plan without the capacity for implementation and on the promise of a transition with no clear path to elections. Rubio, once a stalwart champion of Venezuelan democracy, has been swept away in a gush of oil facilitated by a new beacon of hope: Delcy Rodríguez.