María Corina Machado offers Trump her Nobel Peace medal but Delcy Rodríguez serves her oil on a platter

The visit of Maria Corina Machado to the White House yesterday could well have been a turning point in the plans of Donald Trump. It wasn’t. The American president prepared a lunch behind closed doors, a discreet, low-profile meeting, away from the spotlight, that lasted just over an hour. A formal reception, but foreign to the customs that surround the receptions of heads of State or Government.

“I told President Trump that 200 years ago General La Fayette gave Simón Bolívar a medal with the face of George Washington and since then, Simón Bolívar has never left it.

200 years later, the heirs, the people of Bolívar give the president of the United States… pic.twitter.com/O2HJvbgqbT

— Official Spokesperson of Venezuela (@voceriavzla) January 15, 2026

Machado, who does not hold any official position, entered the White House through a side door, toured the West Wing, but did not even set foot in the Oval Office. The most optimistic wanted to cling to the words she spoke at the exit, where dozens of Venezuelan expatriates were waiting for her. “We can count on President Trump for freedom in Venezuela, and also with the release of all political prisoners,” he assured.

There was no lack of courtesy. “The president hoped to have a good and positive conversation with Machado, who is a very prominent and brave voice for many Venezuelans,” Trump’s spokeswoman said on Wednesday. Caroline Leavitt. Trump himself later commented in an interview with the agency Reuters that he considered Machado a “nice” woman and that he thought they would only talk “about the basics”, without going into details.

This Thursday he showed a little more esteem towards the opposition leader, stating that it has been “a great honor” for him to meet her in person and describing her as “a wonderful woman who has been through a lot.”

Machado, for her part, landed in Washington convinced of giving Trump the medal – and not a replica – of the Nobel Peace Prize, an award that the president of the United States coveted to such an extent that he threatened the Norwegian authorities with retaliation if he was not the one to win it.

And he did not hesitate to accept this Thursday. The president has confirmed that he has received the medallion “for the work done” in Venezuela, a fact that he described as “a wonderful gesture of mutual respect.” “Thank you, María!” he wrote in Truth Social hours after the meeting ended.

The Nobel committee warned the Venezuelan opposition leader last week – and did so again on the eve of her visit to the White House – that she could not “revoke, share or transfer” the prize. But Machado turned a deaf ear, and gave it to him as a sign of gratitude for his intervention in Venezuela. .

“I told President Trump that 200 years ago General Lafayette gave Simón Bolívar a medal with the face of President George Washington, and since then Simón Bolívar never left it. Until the day he died he kept the medal,” Machado declared at the exit. “Exactly 200 years later, the heirs, the people of Bolívar, present the president of the United States with a medal in retribution for his commitment to our freedom.”

Machado was aware of the importance of the meeting, of the need to earn Trump’s respect and to appeal to his ego to force a political transition that closes the chapter on Chavismo. While they were meeting, the White House spokesperson assured that “someday” there would be elections in Venezuela, but that she did not have a calendar. Leavitt made it clear that the president’s position had not changed.

Delcy moves token

As soon as Chavismo was certain that the meeting at the White House had not altered the road map in the slightest, and that Machado was on his way to the Capitol to meet with more than a dozen senators, both Democrats and Republicans, he presented in the National Assembly of Caracas, and through the mouth of Delcy Rodrigueza bill for the partial reform of the Organic Hydrocarbons Law.

Until now, foreign companies that invested in Venezuela had the obligation to work with the state company PDVSA, and it was PDVSA that had to maintain the majority stake. Maduro’s former vice president, who retains the Hydrocarbons portfolio along with the presidential band, plans to liberalize the system to allow “investment flows to be incorporated into new fields.” [petrolíferos]fields in which investment has never been made and fields in which there is no infrastructure.”

A law inspired by “the Chevron model” and designed for this for the American energy companies that did not hesitate to cover up with the promise that the profits generated by oil would go “to workers and public services.” A point his brother emphasized Jorge RodriguezPresident of Parliament.

Less than two weeks after Maduro’s capture, the Trump Administration boasts of having generated nearly $500 million from oil sales as part of an agreement with Caracas, and assures that the funds remain in bank accounts under its control. According to Reutersone of those accounts is opened in Qatar.

Delcy, who addressed the nation this Thursday under the pretext of the annual review of the course – a session set, in principle, for last Monday, but canceled after the capture of Maduro -, promised to hold the presidency “until there can be a transition” and let his people know that he would fight the “diplomatic battle” to keep his relations with China, Russia, Cuba, Iran “and with all the peoples of the world and, at the same time, with the United States.”

The acting president peppered her appeasement speech with belligerent rhetoric. She declared, for example, that if she ever needed to travel to Washington, she would do so “walking on her own two feet, not dragged there.” “I will do it with the tricolor flag. I will do it with the Gloria al Bravo Pueblo marking the rhythm of my heart. It will be standing, never crawling,” he remarked.

Delcy forgot at times that Chavismo is undergoing a metamorphosis in the shadow of Trump, and that she is in charge of directing the process. The regime is slowly converting the country into a protectorate directed from the White House with its necessary collaboration.

Only in this context can the fierce combat he maintains with Machado to gain the trust of the United States be explained. In fact, Maduro’s former vice president had a telephone conversation with Trump the day before that Trump himself defined as “fascinating.”

In parallel, Delcy sent a diplomatic delegation to Washington led by Felix Plasenciaformer Foreign Minister of Chavismo and a man of his utmost confidence, to bypass Machado and try to reopen the Venezuelan Embassy in the United States.

For now, he plays his cards skillfully. So much so that Leavitt valued her disposition: “She has been extremely collaborative and has complied with everything we have asked for.” Trump said Wednesday that she was a “fantastic” person. He had only said of Machado that she was a “nice woman”, but that she had neither “respect” nor “support” within Venezuela. That reality remains unchanged for Trump.

#InVideo📹| President (E) Delcy Rodríguez:

We have the right to maintain relations with China, Russia, Cuba and Iran, as well as with all the people of the world. pic.twitter.com/7GomJrEONQ

— Alfred Nazareth (@luchaalmada) January 15, 2026

The focus is now on the release of political prisoners. A week after Jorge Rodríguez announced the release of a “significant number” of prisoners, only 84 people have left Chavismo’s prisons, according to the count of the NGO Foro Penal.

“But for now, the Trump Administration is not interested in a democratic transition in Venezuela,” he summarizes. Help Onerformer Turkish diplomat with experience in Caracas. “Stability is more important than democracy. As long as things stay calm, everyone wins. Trump gets oil, Delcy stays in power, and the opposition will have to wait their turn until ‘someday.'”