The Biden administration has again fallen victim to its own foreign policy , this time in Venezuela .
Entirely predictably, Nicolas Maduro’s illegitimate regime has stolen its second straight presidential election, propelled by White House concessions and naivete. As a result, the Venezuelan people remain under authoritarian rulers strongly backed by Russia, Cuba, China, and Iran. This is a U.S. failure by any measure.
Responding to Maduro’s first electoral larceny in 2018, Venezuela’s National Assembly, acting under the country’s constitution, declared the presidency vacant. The National Assembly then named Juan Guaido as acting president pending new elections. Some 60 countries, mostly in Europe and the Western Hemisphere, recognized Guaido’s government and its authority over Venezuelan state assets. Many imposed economic sanctions, particularly against PDVSA, the government-owned oil company, to pressure Maduro’s criminal regime into accepting this.
After extensive efforts to oust Maduro, opposition efforts failed in April 2019. Although he successfully reimposed authoritarian rule, the sanctions weakened Venezuela’s already-collapsing economy, forcing Maduro to rely increasingly on illegal drug trafficking for revenue.
Former President Donald Trump’s loss of interest in Venezuela thereafter meant that American policy drifted until his term ended. Unfortunately, and unavoidably, Maduro then proceeded to rig Venezuela’s 2020 parliamentary elections, which the opposition boycotted, giving Maduro’s supporters overwhelming control of the National Assembly.
President Joe Biden’s election brought a return of Obama-like policies toward Latin America, which downplayed Venezuela’s importance to the emerging Beijing-Moscow axis, or to Havana and Tehran.
Meanwhile, now fully in control of Venezuela’s governmental institutions, Maduro systematically dismantled opposition parties. He intimidated anti-regime political leaders ahead of the next presidential election, disqualifying candidates such as Maria Corina Machado, the opposition’s main leader.
Even as this repression was underway, the Biden administration made a deal with Maduro, weakening U.S. sanctions and making other concessions if Maduro committed to holding free and fair elections.
This agreement simply accelerated Maduro’s election-rigging, while simultaneously benefiting the regime through loosened sanctions.
After Venezuela’s July 28 presidential election, Maduro’s officials quickly declared him the winner. No one believed these assertions, not even Biden’s White House. Both the opposition and international observers believed Edmundo Gonzalez, the opposition candidate, had won a 2-1 majority.
Given Maduro’s long record of dishonesty, this was all tragically foreseen, except by the Biden administration. Distracted by his own political troubles, and with the international coalition against Maduro (particularly the Western Hemisphere’s Lima Group) in disarray, Biden had no strategy to respond.
However, led by Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL) and Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), Congress reacted quickly, and with strong bipartisan support, to recognize Gonzalez as Venezuela’s president-elect and reimpose U.S. sanctions.
The White House followed, declaring Gonzalez the winner and abandoning its initial feckless call on Maduro to make public the Venezuelan vote-tally sheets proving he had won.
Leftist regimes in Colombia, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico have so far waffled, not taking a public position on the outcome, and thereby providing Maduro oxygen. Reviving the Lima Group is now critical to show Western Hemisphere solidarity, but doing so requires urgent White House effort to get these important South American countries to recognize Gonzalez.
Without question, all previous American sanctions must be restored immediately, and more should be added.
Venezuela is the right place to start dramatically enhancing U.S. sanctions enforcement: in resolve, capabilities, and resources. Targets of sanctions don’t meekly accept their fate, but do everything possible to evade or mitigate sanctions’ effects. Accordingly, U.S. enforcement must be dynamic, evolving ahead of targets’ efforts to escape the economic bullseye.
The objective of U.S. and multilateral sanctions and other punitive steps against Maduro’s regime must have as their ultimate objective the defeat of “Chavismo” once and for all. Only by sweeping away Venezuela’s reigning ideology and returning government to its people will they have a meaningful chance to better their status, economically and politically, and reduce the heavy hand of foreign influence.
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Although some observers believe Maduro has been weakened, there is no sign his masters in Moscow, Havanna, et al., have gotten the memo. Ensuring that they do should also be a U.S. diplomatic priority.
America failed the Venezuelan people once before. We must not do so again.
John Bolton served as national security adviser to then-President Donald Trump between 2018 and 2019. Between 2005 and 2006, he served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
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