Venezuela’s Post-Maduro Future Is Still Up for Grabs
The alternative to a democratic transition is a calcified autocracy.
I HAVE SPENT MOST OF MY LIFE orienting myself by El Ávila, a peak that rises like a compass needle in the chain of mountains behind Caracas. I grew up seeing it from my window, using it as my north while driving the city’s streets, hiking its trails, and learning its contours by heart. On Saturday, I saw it again—on the news, looming quietly in the background as missiles rained into the city and the United States extracted the authoritarian leader whose regime drove my country into ruin and triggered the largest exodus in the region’s history.
As a Venezuelan human rights lawyer and one of the millions forced to leave my homeland, watching videos of the operation felt surreal. At first, it seemed to mark an end: Maduro was gone. But more recent developments, beginning with President Trump’s Saturday morning press conference, quickly shattered that illusion: The man is gone, but the system that sustained his rule remains.
President Trump expressed a surprising willingness to work with Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s vice president. Rodríguez began her political career under Hugo Chávez and has held numerous prominent positions under Maduro, including oil minister, making her one of the most powerful figures in Venezuela’s political system. She has been sanctioned by several countries, including Canada, the European Union, and the United States during Trump’s first administration, for her role in undermining democratic institutions and human rights in Venezuela. A staunch defender of Maduro’s regime in the UN and other international fora, she has consistently denied the overwhelming evidence of serious human rights abuses in Venezuela.
Most strikingly, during that press conference, and in other statements since by President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, María Corina Machado was sidelined. Machado is the internationally recognized leader of the Venezuelan democratic opposition, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and the architect of an electoral movement that secured a victory in 2024. Evidence presented by Machado, including digital copies of ballots and findings from the UN’s Fact-Finding Mission on Venezuela, confirm that the electoral administration was instructed to announce results that did not reflect the true votes cast.
The ousting of Maduro could still kickstart a democratic transition, but even at this early stage, when events are still unfolding, the continuity favored by the Trump administration could allow the governing system to recalibrate. Authoritarian regimes like Venezuela’s do not vanish with a single leader; they survive by preserving loyal institutions, co-opting elites, and controlling coercive apparatuses. In Venezuela, that apparatus is intact: the security forces, judiciary, state-controlled media, and electoral machinery remain under the control of those who maintained Maduro’s rule. In fact, in the few days since his capture, security forces have already cracked down on activists and journalists covering the aftermath of the U.S. operation, and armed militias have been deployed to patrol the streets and check people’s phones.
Removing the figurehead may satisfy international optics, but without clear rules, timelines, and meaningful opposition participation, it just gives the regime a chance to rebrand itself while further consolidating its power. In other words, this moment could be a renewal of the Venezuelan regime rather than a transition away from it—an opportunity for chavismo to shed its most internationally toxic figure while keeping the structures that allowed him to thrive.
If the goal is genuinely the democratization of the country—and not merely the reactivation of its oil industry—the removal of a single figure is plainly insufficient, especially given the profoundly anti-democratic nature of chavismo and the complex criminal network that has captured and hollowed out every public institution. Through my own work, I have witnessed grave human rights violations firsthand, including the arbitrary detention and brutal torture of students whose only offense was protesting the government. I was proud to be a part of the human rights center that defended them. As a lawyer, a scholar, and especially as a citizen now living in the diaspora, I know all too well that Maduro is merely the visible face of a system that has systematically censored, suffocated, tortured, killed, and exiled its people—abuses that the United Nations Fact‑Finding Mission on Venezuela has found to amount to crimes against humanity.
A genuine democratic transition requires clear, binding rules and meaningful participation by the legitimate opposition. That means prioritizing the release of political prisoners and establishing a credible roadmap toward free and fair elections. It also means ensuring that actors with democratic legitimacy can shape the process and that institutions are reformed to enforce accountability rather than perpetuate impunity. Equally essential is the introduction of mechanisms of transitional justice: after years of widespread and systematic human rights violations, the country cannot move forward without truth, accountability, and reparations.
Political transitions—like all things human—are neither linear nor tidy. The academic literature on negotiated transitions makes clear that they often come at a cost: members of the outgoing regime frequently retain pockets of power and bargain their way out of retribution. Moreover, several sources suggest that Machado does not immediately command the loyalty of the armed forces—an uncomfortable but important reality. However, excluding the democratic opposition at this crucial moment—thereby disregarding the extraordinary risks Venezuelan citizens have taken in their struggle for democracy—and instead backing a regime hardliner diminishes the possibility of a true transition, one that Venezuelans would recognize as such.
For Venezuela, the stakes are enormous. The mountains that once guided me through the streets of Caracas now bear witness to a moment of both possibility and peril. The country cannot afford a half‑measure transition that recycles power while sidelining the opposition that has earned legitimacy. A genuine democratization process—and not simply an autocratic reshuffling—will require courage, accountability, and inclusion.
I hope to see El Ávila again as the backdrop to the beginning of a new era of freedom and justice for my country.
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