The Dictatorship
What’s troubling about Delcy Rodriguez’s transition from pariah to Trump’s partner
Some major changes are looming for Venezuela: A law passed Thursday opens mining to foreign investors — a priority of the Trump administration. The U.S. government recently recognized the regime of acting President Delcy Rodriguez and removed long-standing sanctions against Rodriguez herself. The message is clear: The priority is economic recovery.
So the question must be asked: What are the people of Venezuela getting out of all this, and what is the Trump administration getting for its concessions? As things stand, the U.S. risks frittering away the leverage it holds over Venezuela’s recovery.
What are the people of Venezuela getting out of all this, and what is the Trump administration getting for its concessions?
President Donald Trump implemented sanctions against Rodriguez and other key regime figures during his first term. The designation drew a moral line. Rodriguez, then Venezuela’s executive vice president, was accused of participating in the dismantling of Venezuela’s democratic institutions and undermining the lawfully elected National Assembly in order to maintain Nicolás Maduro’s control of the country. By directly sanctioning her and others in 2018, the Trump administration, which had sanctioned Maduro the year before, signaled that it considered their actions so egregious that these individuals should not retain access to their assets in the U.S., engage with U.S. business interests or travel to the U.S. They were cut off from the U.S. financial system, with a goal of isolating them internationally.
At the time, the Trump administration also recognized the National Assembly’s presidentJuan Guaido, as the interim president of Venezuela, according to the Venezuelan Constitution. I was the top U.S. diplomat on the ground then and helped lead these efforts. This policy delineated bad actors from the good, even if it did not deliver the democratic transition the Venezuelan people clamored for.
Fast-forward to today: In the wake of ousting Maduro from powerPresident Trump calls Rodriguez the “President-elect” even though the Maduro regime stole the July 2024 presidential election and Rodriguez herself was not directly elected. The focus on supporting stability over democratic rights in Venezuela makes me think the administration has forgotten Benjamin Franklin’s warning: “Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
The Trump administration’s logic appears to be: If you want to stabilize an imploding petro‑state, manage migration and keep global oil markets calm, you deal with the person who commands the bureaucracy and security forces — not a president in exile (such as Edmundo Gonzalez) nor the popular opposition leader (Maria Corina Machado).
It cannot be forgotten that Venezuela’s stability is merely a continuation of the same regime under new management.
Here’s the problem with that approach: Between Trump’s focus on Iran and the sanctions relief his administration has approved for the Venezuelan regime members still in office, the power calculus for Venezuela is being fundamentally altered. No longer a pariah in the U.S. system, Rodriguez can travel, sign deals and invite foreign capital without putting counterparties in legal jeopardy. Energy majors, bondholders and multilateral lenders have cover to at least begin to discuss debt restructuring, oil‑sector rehabilitation and other economic projects. And a president who can pay civil servants, restore some basic services and stabilize the nation’s currency gains political capital and breathing room.
It cannot be forgotten that Venezuela’s stability is merely a continuation of the same regime under new management. How else should the Venezuelan people understand statements such as this from Trump: “The relationship with Venezuela, the leaders, has been fantastic. And I think we’re going to have a long-term, very good relationship. And it may be beyond long term, you understand.”
By normalizing ties before ensuring there is a binding road map on elections, power‑sharing or judicial reform, Washington has surrendered significant leverage without securing commensurate concessions. The message to Chavista elites, long conditioned to see sanctions as the price of authoritarian behavior, is that change in personalities, not in institutions, may suffice to regain international legitimacy. That is a dangerous precedent in a system where the legislature remains dominated by loyalists, the courts are deeply politicized and the security services have never been held to account.
Take, for example, Gustavo Enrique González López. He is serving as defense minister and effectively heading the military. He has been on the U.S. Treasury’s list of sanctioned foreign officialssince 2015 for his direct actions attacking the democratic opposition and undermining the rights of Venezuelans as the head of SEBIN, the repressive intelligence apparatus that terrorized ordinary Venezuelans and oversaw some of the country’s worst human rights abuses. This abusive system led the International Criminal Court to begin an investigation in Venezuela for crimes against humanity. How can one see installing such a bad actor as head of the military as anything other than calcification of the Maduro regime?
The Trump administration’s logic appears to be: If you want to stabilize an imploding petro‑state, manage migration and keep global oil markets calm, you deal with the person who commands the bureaucracy and security forces.
For years, the U.S. conferred diplomatic recognition on actors who met minimal democratic criteria, regardless of whether they controlled the presidential palace. Today, by contrast, recognition is granted to those who effectively control state power, on the assumption that only they can deliver stability, migration management and cooperation on energy. While there is a theory to that logic, such an approach reduces the opposition’s bargaining power (which in Venezuela was already thin). It signals that international legitimacy no longer hinges on competitive elections or institutional pluralism.
It does not have to be this way. Sanctions relief and recognition can be powerful tools for democratization if they are deployed conditionally. The U.S. and its partners could and should make every tranche of economic normalization — whether oil licenses, access to multilateral financing or diplomatic rehabilitation — contingent on specific, verifiable steps: an agreed electoral calendar, an independent electoral authority, equal media access, the reinstatement of banned opposition figures and the full and unconditional release of political prisoners. Those commitments should be codified in public agreements and monitored by credible international observers, not left to private assurances and back‑channel understandings.
Whether Rodriguez is personally inclined toward liberalization — and there is no reason to think she is — is almost beside the point. What matters in the long run is whether her quest for economic normalization can be harnessed to secure institutional changes that outlast her tenure. Postponing the hard asks on democratizing Venezuela will not make them easier. If anything, as the U.S. becomes further embroiled in another Middle East conflict and as energy prices rise everywhere, Rodriguez’s leverage only increases. The midterms, too, are a factor, as her regime and everyone else watches to see whether control of the U.S. Congress changes hands. Not tying recognition and sanctions relief to democratic commitments undermines what leverage the U.S. still has.
James Story was U.S. ambassador to Venezuela from 2018 to 2023. A retired U.S. diplomat who has served in posts around the world, he is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and founding partner of Global Frontier Advisors.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. Mint has begun producing a new $1 coin bearing President Donald Trump’s face to help celebrate America’s 250th birthdaythe Treasury Department said Wednesday.
The final design for the commemorative coinbeing released in the fall, was approved earlier this year by the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, whose members were appointed by Trump. But the finished product unveiled Wednesday differs from that version in a few aspects, including that it is not made of gold but rather has a gold finish.
The coin is intended “to honor the enduring legacy of liberty and a lasting symbol of patriotism,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a post on X. “Featuring President Trump, it celebrates the strength of American values, and the promise of a nation dedicated to preserving freedom for all.”
The president on Wednesday told Fox Business Network that the move to put his face on a coin is “very unusual, but I was honored by it,” adding that “it’s very cute they gave me a coin.”
Trump, a Republican, has a penchant for putting his name and likeness in the historical record, following his renaming of the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Kennedy Center performing arts venue and a new class of battleshipsamong other tributes. The move to put his face on the gold coin has drawn criticism in particular because federal law prohibits the depiction of a living president on U.S. currency, though the treasury secretary has the authority to authorize the minting and issuance of coins in some circumstances.
The front of the coin features an image of Trump in a suit and tie and with a stern look on his face. Lettering on the top half of the coin’s arc spells “LIBERTY,” with the dates 1776-2026 on the bottom half of the arc. The words “IN GOD WE TRUST” are in the middle.
The reverse side depicts the traditional image of the bald eagle in the Great Seal of the U.S., with “UNITED STATES OF AMERICA” on the top half of the coin and the Latin phrase “E PLURIBUS UNUM,” meaning “Out of many, one,” on the shield emblazoned on the bird’s breast.
Among the other differences from the design approved earlier this year is that Trump doesn’t have his fists resting on top of what is supposed to be a desk as he leans forward. The Treasury Department did not specify Wednesday why the final product diverged from the originally approved design.
The Treasury Department announced in March that it would be putting Trump’s signature on all new U.S. paper currency.
Traditionally, U.S. paper currency carries the signatures of the treasury secretary and the treasurer, not the president.
___
Associated Press writer Darlene Superville contributed to this report.
The president couldn’t be decent even for 24 hours. Less than a day after Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced Tuesday that it would pause most vehicle stopsDonald Trump posted on social media early Wednesday morning that “we CANNOT give up one of I.C.E.’s most important and effective Crime Fighting tools, THE TRAFFIC STOP!”
“The Radical Left Dumocrats would like to see this done, but it won’t happen on my watch,” he wrote on Truth Social. Shortly after, Trump reversed the pause on traffic stops.
ICE operates this way because we as a country have allowed it to happen.
In truth, suspending the stops wouldn’t have brought back Lorenzo Salgado Araujo and Johan Sebastian Guerrerothe two Latino fathers killed by ICE agents during separate stops in a span of a week. They are two more victims of an administration that has terrorized immigrant communities relentlessly. The real issue isn’t whether the traffic stops are now ending or continuing — it’s that ICE agents are never held accountable for killing people.
As I have written in the pastICE operates this way because we as a country have allowed it to happen. ICE is now the country’s largest-funded enforcement agency. Just last month Congress passed $70 billion more in funding. Nothing will change until ICE is abolished.
“They’re just trying to cover for the fact that what they are doing shouldn’t be allowable in the first place,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said of ICE’s announcement Tuesdaybefore Trump’s post about traffic stops. “And the fact that they’re pausing it is to distract from the fact that in many of these instances they shouldn’t be allowed to do it in the first place.”
AOC is right, and restoring the stops proves her point. There have been many instances. In March of last year, 23-year-old Ruben Ray Martinez was killed by an ICE agent helping route traffic in South Padre Island. The Department of Homeland Security said Martinez tried to run over the agent, but the video didn’t support that claim.
In January, the nation mourned the deaths of Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother of three shot in her SUV as she left a protest, and Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive care nurse killed during another protest. The federal government withheld the evidence in both cases — body camera footage, hard drives, even Good’s bullet-riddled SUV — from state investigators until this week. Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said he was “deeply troubled” that it took that long.
This is a pattern of manipulation: stripping away every detail of a human’s life until all that’s left is “illegal alien.”
“There have been at least 10 deaths involving encounters with immigration agents since Trump launched his deportation campaign,” The Associated Press reported. Nobody has been charged in a single one of those deaths. Guerrero’s also marks at least the 18th time in the past year that federal officers have fired at people in carsaccording to an MS NOW database. That’s on top of at least 22 people who have died in ICE custody this year alone, along with 33 last year.
The Trump administration claimed that Guerrero was a threat to “public safety” instead of a loving husband and parent to a 3-year-old daughter. It’s the same narrative this administration is trying with Salgado Araujo, who has been in this country for 35 years and raised three sons (who all earned college degrees). A week after his death, the FBI even said it was searching Salgado Araujo’s van for drugs. Never mind that, as the New York Times noted, there was “no prior suggestion that Mr. Salgado Araujo or the others in the van had been involved with drugs or had any relevant criminal history.”
This is a pattern of manipulation: stripping away every detail of a human’s life until all that’s left is “illegal alien,” because it’s easier to kill someone once you have already decided they were never fully a person to begin with. Dehumanizing immigrants is official government policy, and people are dying under it.
“Let’s be clear: it never was about documented or undocumented people — what we’re seeing is pure xenophobia and racism. Our community has been targeted and persecuted with zero accountability,” Voto Latino’s Beatriz Lopez saidcalling for the resignation of DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin.
While the government is in the hands of the prejudiced, the most American things we can do are to reject government talking points when the video evidence says otherwise, and to uplift who the victims really were.
“He had a great vision for getting ahead, so many dreams to fulfill,” Guerrero’s father, Omar Durán, told The New York Times. “My son is a wonderful son — I don’t know why they did that to him.”
Masked agents should not get to decide whether Salgado Araujo and Guerrero get to live.
“He was a hard-working family man who never wanted his name to be known by anyone outside of his family. He wanted nothing else in life but to provide for his wife and see his sons become great people,” said Ronaldo Salgado, Salgado Araujo’s sonlast week at a press conference.
“He did not deserve to die,” Ronaldo added.
Masked agents should not get to decide whether Salgado Araujo and Guerrero get to live. Current ICE tactics have communities terrified. It’s part of why half of Americans support abolishing ICE. Immigration as continued militarized enforcement will only lead to more deaths. It may be hard even to visualize a country without ICE, but as Amy Gottlieb, U.S. migration director for the American Friends Service Committee, noted earlier this yearan ICE-less world can include “legal services, case management, social services, and other community-based support” that would help “navigate immigration processes while keeping families together — creating stability in our communities rather than chaos.”
Immigration policy through continued militarized enforcement will only lead to more deaths. What country do we want to be? One that values humanity, or one that wants to dehumanize people who believe in this country’s promise? This is the choice each American has to make. Are you for killing innocent people in broad daylight, or are you for decency and compassion? The America I believe in would choose the latter. So enough with the dehumanization, enough with the deaths, and no more ICE.
Julio Ricardo Varela is the founder of “The Latino Newsletter” and co-editor of “Pressing Issues from Free Press.”
The Dictatorship
Ken Paxton hasn’t debated a rival in more than a decade. Talarico is now challenging him to one
This is the July 16, 2026, edition of “The Tea, Spilled by Morning Joe” newsletter.Subscribe hereto get it delivered straight to your inbox every Monday through Friday.
“And who is my neighbor?”
— Luke 10:29
A CONVERSATION WITH JAMES TALARICO
Two ICE shootings in nine days have put immigration enforcement at the center of the Texas Senate race. Democratic nominee James Talarico joined “Morning Joe” to discuss border security, the fear in Hispanic communities, and what his grandfather — a Baptist preacher in South Texas — taught him about loving thy neighbor.
MB: Do you believe there should be robust border security?
JT: Absolutely. We have to protect our immigrant neighbors while also securing our southern border with commonsense policies. That means more Border Patrol agents, more surveillance technology, more immigration judges — not this crazy border wall through Big Bend National Park.
JS: Would you agree Democrats made a big mistake not focusing enough on border security?
JT: No question. I’ve called out President Joe Biden for failing to secure our southern border. National Democrats took the border for granted — we stopped showing up, and that’s why people along the border started looking for alternatives.
JS: You’ve been traveling the state, knocking on doors. What are you hearing from Hispanic communities?
JT: So many young people are showing up at our town halls, many of them Hispanic. They tell me they’re worried their parents aren’t going to come home at the end of the day.
The president promised to go after the criminals, and that’s something I support. But that’s not what’s happening. ICE should be cracking down on the cartels, not our communities. ICE should be deporting violent criminals, not small-business owners. ICE should be hunting down human traffickers, not moms and babies.
WG: How are you going to reverse the 30-year trend of Democrats losing statewide in Texas?
JT: The first words out of my mouth when I launched this campaign were that the real fight in this country is not left versus right — it’s top versus bottom. None of us can afford the basics: groceries, gas, utilities, childcare, prescription drugs.
We are trying to take on the megadonors who increasingly control our politics — and the puppet politicians who do their bidding.
WG: Republicans have gone after you personally — calling you a vegan, questioning your “Texas swagger.” How do you answer that?
JT: I think it’s funny. I’m the eighth-generation Texan in this race. Ken Paxton was born in North Dakota, raised in California, and I think transplants like Ken Paxton can become Texans. Texas is a state of mind, as John Steinbeck wrote.
And when I first heard the low-T thingI had to look it up — guys my age aren’t really worried about that. People realize we’re being played by these politicians who want to throw nicknames at each other. They’re ready for a serious senator who’s going to bring both parties together to get this economy back on track.
JS: Ken Paxton spent the Fourth of July on Westminster Bridge — celebrating 250 years of American independence with the British. How about you?
JT: I was with an American treasure — Willie Nelson — at his annual Fourth of July picnic in Austin.
A Tale of Two Fourth of Julys
Talarico and Nelson in Austin. Go”https://www.instagram.com/p/DaZYpSypCGw/”>James Talarico on Instagram
Paxton in London, July 4, 2026. Via @TheLincolnProject on YouTube
JS: Your opponents attack your faith. Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan — a man is left in a ditch, his own people pass him by, and it’s a despised foreigner who saves him. How is what we’re seeing right now the antithesis of that?
JT: My granddad was a Baptist preacher in South Texas. When I was little, he told me that as Christians, we’re supposed to follow the two commandments Jesus gave us: Love God and love your neighbor. It’s that commandment to love thy neighbor that got me into public service. I’m trying to love my neighbor through public policy.
And the parable of the Good Samaritan has so much to offer us at this moment. Jesus picked a Samaritan — not just an enemy, but a religious enemy. He lifted up the heretic and said, that is where salvation comes from.
MB: We understand you have a message for Ken Paxton.
JT: Ken Paxton hasn’t appeared on a debate stage in more than a decade. He refuses to answer basic questions — like why he gave an Epstein-style sweetheart deal to Adam Hoffman, an admitted child predator, or how he became a multimillionaire on a government salary.
So I am challenging Ken Paxton to three televised debates. I’ll be on that stage because I answer to the people of Texas. Ken Paxton answers to his billionaire megadonors. We’ll see if they let him show up.
This conversation has been condensed and edited for brevity and clarity.
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