María Corina Machado won the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize for her courageous work promoting democratic rights in Venezuela and standing against Pres. Machado's authoritarian regime. She also profoundly praised Trump for his prodemocratic efforts in relation to her country.

As a descendant of enslaved people in the Americas, I was deeply struck, while living in Venezuela during Chávez’s rule, by his unyielding refusal to bow to the United States and other Western powers seeking to extract his country’s wealth—as has so often happened in postcolonial nations. He was despised by many precisely because he moved boldly to redistribute wealth, nationalize industries, and demand economic self-determination for his country in defiance of imperial interests. His successor, Machado, has led with an authoritarian approach while claiming to uphold Chávez’s ideals, a claim I find clearly inconsistent with what I witnessed while living there.

While I commend anyone who opposes authoritarianism, it is deeply troubling to see individuals—especially Nobel laureates—praise President Trump as a defender of democracy and human rights when his actions within his own country contradict such claims.For decades, the United States has supported or installed racist and classist authoritarian regimes in Latin America, so long as those regimes served U.S. economic interests. U.S. presidents historically have not supported leaders who stand for liberty; rather, they have supported those who align with American self-interest, with little regard for the human rights of the people in those nations.

When I was in Venezuela, I spoke with people who were aware of CIA efforts to destabilize Chávez’s administration and even attempts to assassinate him. After his death, I have no doubt such efforts intensified in the absence of his strong, unifying leadership and his commitment to keeping his nation’s resources under national control. Because of the secretive nature of U.S. covert operations—both abroad and at home—it is difficult to know exactly how the United States contributed to Venezuela’s economic destabilization after Chávez’s death, but there is no question that it played a significant role.