Nobel Peace Prize Winner: María Corina Machado on Defeating Maduro, Socialism & Freeing Venezuela

0:00Maria Corina Machado, welcome to the all in interview, and thank you for being here with me today. and congratulations on winning the Nobel Peace Prize two weeks ago. Thank you very much, David. It's my pleasure. Today, you are in hiding. In October of 2023, you won the presidential primary election in Venezuela. Last March, you were disqualified from running in the general election. You appointed ultimately a surrogate Edmundo Gonzalez. After the vote for the general election for the presidency, your party presented evidence that claimed that you had won 69.5 % of the votes while Maduro, through the National Electoral Council, declared that he was the winner with 51 % of the votes.

0:46This is the recap of a very long story of the Maduro regime and prior to that the Chavez regime and its effect on the people of Venezuela, which you have tried to bring to light on the global stage. I was hoping to frame up the story for our audience who may not know the history of Venezuela very well by talking a little bit about the background of the country and how your childhood and your youth brought you to the stage that you're on today. And just to provide a little bit of background and forgive me for my lengthy introduction, but I think it's important for folks to understand that the discovery of oil in Venezuela in 1914 began an economic boom that really kicked off in 1922.

1:29Today, Venezuela has proven oil reserves of 300 billion barrels, the number one proven oil reserve in the world. Saudi Arabia is number two at 266 billion and the US is at 48 billion. Over the decades that followed the discovery of oil in Venezuela, there was initially an improvement in the economy through the investment by the Seven Sisters, which are a group of seven oil companies. And ultimately, there was a transition in the country to nationalize oil production. And that led to, I think, the story that brings us here today. So Maria Karina, again, thank you for being here. Maybe you could tell us a little bit about your youth.

2:06Well, first of all, I have to thank you because this is a unique, decisive moment in Venezuela. We've been under this tyranny that has turned into a real criminal structure for 26 years that have turned, you know, what used to be one of the freest and richest countries in the Americas into one of the poorest and with a third of our population forced to flee. So imagine what a tragedy. It shows that, you know, you can have huge, unique natural endowments, but that's not wealth. You need talent, you need institutions, and you need freedom in order to turn that in the well-being of your people. I was born in an incredible family.

2:52I thank the Lord because we have a huge family, like Latin American family, like to be together, hanging around all the time. My father was an incredible industrial entrepreneur. He is perhaps the smartest and most generous and honest individuals I've met in my life. And he taught us the responsibility that comes with that, with your family values and the opportunity life gives you. And that's why I only imagined my life in Venezuela and in freedom. And we grew with that sense of responsibility. But to be honest, I'm part of a generation that, you know, look politics with, you know, rejection or even contempt.

3:46I said I would do anything in my life but politics. And, you know, we thought that we had inherited democracy forever. We took it for granted. And when Chavez arrived, our lives were, you know, turned over. And we realized that we need to exercise citizenship if we wanted to live with freedom. That's how it all started. I never thought I would be sitting here with you talking about politics or democracy. I never thought I would be sitting on a podcast, but life takes us down strange paths. What were the conditions in the country when Chavez came to power? What sort of life were you living? What were you seeing in the country that enabled Chavez to come to power?

4:38And what did he promise the people? Look, we had a period of democracy that brought Venezuela huge opportunities, you know, that widespread education and health. Unfortunately, we stopped short of a real free economy. but the state control, not only of institutions, but as you mentioned, when all companies were turned into the government, and terrible incentives started being created, and more and more people felt excluded from that wealth that the Venezuelan society was getting or the country was getting because it was all in the hands of the state. So we've never known but the state-controlled economy.

5:35We've never always known or never seen anything but that kind of socialist procedures in place. When Tavis arrived, we had gone through a political crisis and there were grown tensions and planes of corruption in the political system, the party system. And also the price of oil had, you know, declined. It was around$8 a barrel. So he came with a populist narrative offering, you know, everyone to be equal and to revenge against all those that were guilty of poverty in the country. And, you know, he aligned with actors such as Fidel Castro in Cuba and other international interests to grab, you know, those huge resources Venezuela has.

6:31And, of course, in a, you know, super strategic geographic position. So that's how he got there. And that populist system turned into autocratic and then into criminal structure. And this was 1999 that he came to power? Yes, that was in 1999. And at the time, I think when he took office, oil was at around$14 per barrel. And a few years later, oil spiked up to$100 per barrel. Even less. Yeah, that's true. Just to contextualize all of this, prior to his coming to power, the oil companies had been nationalized. So to your point, the government was really the economy. And he promised this sort of equality and redistribution of value for all of the people of Venezuela.

7:19Is that what he promised? And the economy was really depressed because of the oil price being down. Yeah, and that he would take, you know, resources from the rich, the companies, and he would distribute in poor quarters and in the most vulnerable parts of society. And at the end, we learned the hard way that effectively, this kind of socialist approach does get everyone equal in absolute misery, because there's nothing for free in life. I mean, you give away your choices, your decisions, supposedly to receive, but actually what you are getting is into a slave situation in which the state decides for you and only if you behave accordingly, you will get what they had offered.

8:13So that's what we're seeing right now. Imagine this, David, the country that has the largest oil reserves in the world. I've been walking around those areas where that oil is actually beneath the ground and you see children eating from garbage. It's unbelievable. And I think to your point, and I was going to bring this up later, but there's such a powerful lesson to be learned for the West, for America, for Europe. Socialism is slavery. And I think the story that you bring to the world is one of slavery driven by this kind of socialist tyranny. There is no socialism without tyranny. But I just want to walk through that a little bit because as Chavez came to power, oil went up to$100 a barrel.

9:01Suddenly, Venezuela's oil reserves made the country very wealthy. And he then engaged in a series of what some people have described to me as petro diplomacy, where he gave away 300 ,000 barrels of oil per day to the Cubans at a 50 % price discount in order to make the Cubans a surrogate in order to make other island nations in the Caribbean, in the African island states, surrogates. And that's how Venezuela expressed their political influence around the world was through the power of the oil reserves, but in such a way that it excluded the people from participation. It seemed to be very centralized to the government.

9:45Maybe you could share a little bit about how folks in the government, in the military under Chavez, lived these incredible lives with wealth and luxury while the people were impoverished. Any anecdotes you could share on that? Yeah, sure. Look, this is a result that's been tried in Venezuela and elsewhere. You get into power through elections, and then from within, you start undermining every single democratic institution. You go against the media. You control the media. And you can see this pattern in Venezuela, how Chavez started pressing or buying space and publicity and then buying the whole media outlets and through censorship and changing the laws in order to be very, very risky to speak out.

10:39And then it went also with the private sector in every single area of production. And of course, it took the military as well. I mean, all those that were the most competent individuals that were put aside and only those that were absolutely loyal to the regime were offended. So this is to destroy merit so that anybody realizes that if you want to be part of the system, if you want to work for the state or the academy or in the military, it has nothing to do with your competence or knowledge or talent. But you have to be absolutely loyal and low your head to the regime. And this progressively, imagine all the resources that were coming in, because you said something very important that some people did not realize.

11:29I mean, the barrel of oil was around 10 or 8 when Chavez arrived. It went up to$150 a barrel. Imagine the amount of resources. It was all the money in the world that they used effectively to buy loyo and to lobby around the world and to support ideological groups all over the Western Hemisphere and elsewhere. And these groups and, let's say, these terms get in contact with each other. They exchange technology. They exchange information. They support each other in international forms. And that's why they get so powerful in their different areas and countries. On the other hand, what we have seen is that democracies and democratic movements in our side of the world are very isolated.

12:28We don't help each other. We don't support each other as we should. I think this is one of the great lessons that we've learned in these 20 years. Regarding the amount of resources, look, there are estimates that the tag that Venezuela was robbed is over$2 trillion. Imagine what we're talking about in these 26 years. And this was all either went for corruption, as I said, or for this kind of obscene fortunes these very few individuals have, while 86 % of our population nowadays lives in poverty. The pensions in Venezuela are less than$1 a month, David. $1 a month. Yeah. And so under Chavez, there was also this embracing or tie up with the drug trade, the FARC, ELN in Colombia.

13:32What is the alignment? What was the reason that the Chavez regime and now the Maduro regime aligns with the drug cartels? given the oil wealth, given the international diplomatic ties because of the oil trade, why is there also a drug tie-up and what is the motivation and the incentive and drive there? Well, the drug business isn't new. Actually, it started before Chavez arrived and many individuals in the military had ties to them. But they realized it could be even much more, the margins are even larger than in oil. And the greed in these individuals, in this criminal structure is unlimited.

14:15It's infinite. So they not only went into drugs and drug trafficking, they went into gold smuggling, arms smuggling, even human trafficking. I mean, every single criminal network in the world has, you know, convert into Venezuela that has been turned into a safe haven for the enemies of the West and the enemies of the United States. Imagine, I mean, Caracas is three hours away from Miami. So having, you know, a satellite of Russia, of Iran, operating in the heart of the Americas, it's something that, you know, these regimes around the world have always learned of. Even terrorist groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas, to which Chavez and Maduro have given thousands of Venezuelans identities and passports to travel around freely around the world.

15:12So under Chavez, the GDP declined 70%. There was mass starvation, highest crime rates in the world, 90 % poverty rate. Much of the stories and anecdotes that you've shared have been reported publicly by international organizations. You are 32 years old when Chavez comes to power. Three years later, you start a civil organization called Sumate. What were you doing when Chavez came to power professionally? And what motivated you to get involved in the civic engagement that carried you forward to today? Well, I have been working in the private auto parks and steel industry, following my pilot steps.

15:58and also I was involved in an NGO that took over a children shelter for abandon and abuse children and you know, as I say, I never thought I would get involved into politics but once this individual arrives and it's evident for us that he was promoting the division of our country to create tensions, to divide even families, even my own family. The degree of hatred, of violence in his speech, the way he wanted to create tensions among religions, races. He realized that that was going to turn part of our country. And a group of friends, all engineers, decided that we will work to gather petitions for a recall referendum.

16:54We thought it was going to be a super easy task to get six million petitions in a few weeks. And we learned the hard way it would require a totally new kind of citizen organization. And that's how Subate with News Join Up finally managed to gather the petitions. in just one day, people, millions of people came out and signed these petitions. It's a long story. Chavez eventually committed fraud in the referendum and stayed empowered and got even more and more autocratic as the years passed by. So were you doing Sumaté full time? Did that become your life's work at that point? And then how did you make the decision to run for the National Assembly, which was in 2011.

17:50Fast forward nine years after founding Sumate. Sumate was like an awakening for me and for many Venezuelans. We realized that we could not rely our citizenship in political parties and that you cannot be complaining about politics if you're not willing to do your part. And that's why, you know, it came a day when I said, you know, I know how politics are doing how it works. I don't like it. So I cannot complain if I'm not willing to take my own steps. So I took this fellowship to a program in leadership at Yale University. And, you know, it was like seeing my life from above. And I made that huge decision that I was going to go for it.

18:43I was going to run for countries. I had no political party. I had no experience. Everything was against me. Everybody told me, you are crazy. You are never going to win. You are never going to get support. Nobody's going to support someone whose family has resources, who's a woman. You are divorced. You are not a socialist. I have every single condition to fail. and I decided I felt it was my responsibility I could not get afraid and I had to trust my own feeling and it was impressive volunteers started contacting me and in a matter of months with no money whatsoever, no organization, no media, nothing.

19:44I won. I won the primaries. And then for the National Assembly, that was in 2010. And then I won the election with the highest number of votes in Venezuelan Congress history. Amazing. How much of a role did the Internet play? I worked at Google a long time ago, and we always had this conversation that the internet is going to create a democratization of information, that you no longer had centralized control of information through media. And in the case of Venezuela, media that is effectively controlled by a government that wants to stay in power. Did the internet play a role in giving you the ability to reach people around the country in 2010 to be able to get elected?

20:33Absolutely. And not only that, in 2010, I wouldn't have won if it wasn't for the internet. I mean, no media outlet would dare to interview me. And it was a way in which we could organize because we have no resources. But further ahead, let me tell you, I know how there are so many concerns about the use of technology by bad guys and by the regimes that are autocratic. And Venezuela is, you know, a textbook case of how you get infiltrated, persecuted, manipulation, and so on. But if it wasn't for technology, we wouldn't be here as a third-fold society. of freedom. And this is something that we need to really highlight, David.

21:23So you are like all great revolutionary leaders speaking truth to power. You have a seat at the table now. You're in the National Assembly. And then in March of 2014, you address the Organization of American States about Venezuela's human rights. And then a few days later, you were expelled from the Assembly. And then there was all this legal stuff that happened, which we don't need to get into. But can you just frame up what happened in that moment, kind of what your narrative is on the transition where they said you can no longer be a representative here anymore? Well, I had had a previous experience just one year before, because we went for a presidential election, and we won against Maduro when Chavez died.

22:07And they committed fraud, and we weren't able to prove it, that we have won. And that was in April 2013. And I went back to the National Assembly. I stood up and I said, Maduro is not the legitimate president. We won. And suddenly, I hear someone calling my name. I turn around and there was this member of the parliament of the charista regime that hit me in the face, and she broke my nose in five pieces. And we were locked in Congress. I was thrown to the floor. I was kicked by this. And Diosdado Cabello was watching everything. He was the president of the National Assembly. So this was, you know, an evidence that violence had gotten out of control.

22:59Imagine if you can do that in a TV. It was seen on TV throughout the country and the world while they were shouting us. So next year, we started peaceful protest and the regime ordered young people that were in the streets, you know, just with flags to be shot at. So I went to the OAS, Organization of American States, and it was the first time Maduro was accused of human rights violations internationally. As soon as I came back, they just ejected me from the National Assembly and by force prohibited me from going back into my seat. So it was a very hard moment, but at the same time, it was a great opportunity because I realized that I needed to reach out personally to our country and create a totally new organization that promoted our ideas and prepared for the next stage of the struggle.

24:09And this was in 2014. Can you share about the Maduro transition? Maduro is, on paper, seemingly wouldn't have been the natural successor to Chavez. He started out as a bus driver and then he was a union leader. It's unclear from the outside what makes Maduro the selected successor to Chavez. What is it about him as a man, as a person, with his character that made him the successor to the Chavez regime? Well, Maduro was trained in Cuba. So it was the Cubans who chose Maduro. It was a very easy option for them. Totally loyal to the communist Castro regime. And Maduro has no, you know, nothing restricts him from exercising, you know, violence and force for his ideas.

25:06and he certainly doesn't have Chavez charisma, nor the degree of control in the other groups. So they were creating, you know, like a group of individuals that had the control of the system, the strategy, the structure that controlled the military, the financial enablers, the criminal networks, and the political sectors. And that's how he went over, taking more and more control and turning Venezuela, as I mentioned before, into this safe haven of criminal activities. And he himself turned into the head of these structures. When we heard about El Tren de Aragua, now about the Cartel de los Soles, the Cartel of the Sons.

25:52I mean, these are structures that we have denounced for years. And we have tried the world to understand that this was not a conventional dictatorship anymore. This is, you know, a very complex structure that, you know, produces obscene amounts of resources, not only for them, but also for very dangerous allies that come from very far, such as the ones I mentioned before, terrorist groups and so on. They, you know, they turned Venezuela into one of the Russians' main buyers of army and weapons and also one of the, I would say, the major stronghold of the Iranian regime abroad. I mean, they use Venezuelan financial system to bypass financial sanctions and they use our territory to operate freely.

26:52And what about China? Can you share a little bit about China's relationship with Venezuelan leadership in Maduro and when that became a more kind of intimate economic tie? Well, Venezuela turned to be China's main debtor with over 60 billion dollars in debts that accounted for all kinds of different projects that were never built. And certainly China realized that Venezuela's natural endowments are unique, absolutely unique. It was strategical. Nonetheless, the degree of corruption in the system and in this system is so big that China stopped funding Maduro about seven years ago and simply is getting the oil to pay for the debts that are still pending.

27:56I believe China understands the strategic importance Venezuela has also for its geographic location, but has been more prudent because of the degree of corruption that they have suffered from Maduro and the regime. But there's also the side of the, you know, the intelligence, spionage, and technology, and satellites from China that have been installed in Venezuela. That's very important I mentioned for Venezuela. as well. Venezuela is a country of, I think, 28 million people. By some estimates, 8 million people have fled the country. Does that feel accurate to you? And can you provide some anecdotes of why people leave, where they go, and what it's like in the country that's causing this mass exodus of the population?

28:51Look, we're a nation of a little over 30 million. I mean, This is a country where you have no information whatsoever. Imagine living in a country where you know how many you are. You don't know what's the size of your debt or your GDP or inflation. Nothing. It's a black box. That's why it's also a challenge in terms of what's coming up. But roughly 9 million people have left. It is around 30 % of our population. Imagine if 30 % of American people leave, what it would mean. No, it's devastating. Because we're seeing, you know, our young people, our children. Doctors, engineers, scientists, nurses, teachers.

29:41And of course they go because the situation from an economic perspective is horrible. But mostly because you don't see a future in your country. because you feel there's no possibility to survive. So women that have left their young children back only to send something for them to eat. Children that have left their parents alone. I've met so many, so many grandparents that have not met their grandchildren yet. And they try and help me and ask me, please, please bring my grandchildren back. And we all know that the only possibility for that to happen is that we, you know, have a transition to democracy.

30:25And when that happens, David, you will see the day Maduro goes, hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans voluntarily coming back. Even though they know it's a hard moment that we'll have, you know, to work really hard. But we know the potential, that unique potential. and they want to be part of this. It's much more than a political struggle. For us, it's an existential struggle as a nation and also spiritual struggle as well. A lot of people will say, why don't they go on the streets today? Can you talk a little bit about the intimidation of the Maduro regime and why it's so difficult for people to rise up in the way that we have seen other revolutions historically around the world?

31:16What keeps that from happening? What are the mechanisms that are used to stay in power by the Maduro regime? Look, and we have seen that in Venezuela many times as well. I mean, we're talking about thousands of times in protests, in peaceful, you know, rallies, in people going out by tens of thousands and even hundreds of thousands. But the regime has developed, this regime, Maduro, with the Cuban intelligence mechanisms to infiltrate. And anyone who goes out is either detained, harmed, killed, disappeared. When we won the election last year in July 28, thousands of people went to the streets while we were counting the votes, which I want to tell you a little bit more ahead.

32:03And, you know, in a matter of 24 hours, 2 ,500 people were in prison, including young people, children, women that were even sexually assaulted, abused, just because they had gone out to the streets to peacefully claim for their right, for popular sovereignty to be respected. But they went beyond that, David. They went to the houses of our activists that had been taking care of the election, that worked as witnesses, that took care of the townships, and they took them away. And if they weren't there, then they would grab their families, their mothers, their children, their couples, and every single person who even posted my picture on their Instagram account or X account, whatever, they would go and take them as well.

33:06So it was so brutal that the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights enabled it as state terrorism. And the fact that the mission of the United Nations has said those are crimes against humanity. It was so wide, so systematic that what they wanted is to terrify society. society so we've had these last 15 months a period of darkness as we've never seen before i i was accused of terrorism but it was searching for me he said i would spend the rest of my life in prison some people think it would be even worse um but you know all my team which you know manage the campaign, this campaign that took place, are either in prison or they have to leave the country.

34:07So, this is a moment in which, you know, fear has been, you know, imposed by brutal force, but that doesn't mean that Venezuelan society is neutralized on the country. As we managed to organize for an incredible epic episode when We won the election. Now we have been organizing underground and preparing for the day in which democracy will come and people will make sure it is an orderly process. Maduro has publicly said many times that you are a puppet of the West, that the U.S. and its allies are trying to interfere in Venezuelan politics because of their economic interest in the Venezuelan oil reserves.