In the News

By Emily Neil and Sarah Mueller 

While U.S. lawmakers have praised and condemned the Trump administration’s military strikes on Venezuela and the capture of President Nicolás Maduro, a leader in the Philadelphia region’s Venezuelan community said the day’s news brought about “mixed emotions” regarding the South American country’s future.

“As a Venezuelan American … what is happening right now in our nation, in our country, in [the] United States, I do not agree with many of the things that the federal government is doing at all whatsoever,” said Nelly Jiménez-Arévalo, who works in local government and previously served on former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s Advisory Commission on Latino Affairs. “However, I think this was the only way that Maduro was going to leave Venezuela.”

Jiménez-Arévalo emphasized that Maduro is an “illegitimate president.” Domestic and international analyses by media organizations and election watchdog groups found that opposition party candidate Edmundo González defeated Maduro in the 2024 elections.

“I think what people don’t understand is that Maduro wasn’t going to leave on his own,” she said. “History will tell … what is going to happen next. But I think that if the military wouldn’t have taken Maduro, he wouldn’t have gone peacefully.”

In the aftermath of the attacks, Jiménez-Arévalo says she is concerned for the safety of her family members living in Venezuela. Many individuals from Maduro’s regime are still in power, and she fears retaliation from paramilitary groups that are friendly to Maduro and persecution of political prisoners.

“We want a transition,” she said. “At the same time, you’re thinking about the people who are [on] the ground, who are living through this. I think that the best is to really make sure that there is actually a real transition of government, from dictatorship to a new democracy, that is going to help Venezuela to start healing.”

Jiménez-Arévalo also criticized Trump’s policies as “contradictory,” saying his administration is carrying out a “coordinated attack” on Venezuelan immigrants in the United States by taking away Temporary Protected Status and work permits, as well as ramping up deportations.

“Yes, we’re going to go … to Venezuela and defend Venezuela’s democracy, but here we treat Venezuelans …  like criminals, right?” she said. “So I think that’s a contradiction.”

Venezuela’s uncertain future

During a press conference Saturday morning at Mar-a-Lago, President Donald Trump said Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were being taken to New York to face drug and weapons charges. Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the press conference characterized the couple as “indicted fugitives of American justice.”

In a statement, nonprofit groups Casa de Venezuela Philadelphia, Casa de Venezuela Delaware and Gente de Venezuela Philadelphia called for “peace, calm, harmony, and non-confrontation,” and asked Venezuelans in the region to carefully fact-check and verify posts on social media before sharing to prevent the spread of misinformation.

“This is a developing situation, and many details about the timing, manner, and mechanisms through which a potential transition process may unfold are still unknown,” the statement reads. “In light of this reality, we call for caution and patience, and we express our hope and faith that the restoration of democratic order, institutions, and respect for the will of the Venezuelan people will be a fundamental priority in any future scenario.”

The organizations are planning a mass and vigil for the future of Venezuela on Sunday at 12 p.m. at the Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Organizers said it will be a “space for reflection, faith, and community gathering.”

Trump said the United States will “run” Venezuela “until such time that we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition.” The president offered few details, saying only that “a group” would control the Venezuelan government, but he did speak about the prospect of contracting with American oil companies to rebuild infrastructure in Venezuela to extract the country’s vast oil reserves.

“We are going to run the country right,″ Trump said. “It’s going to make a lot of money.”

A coalition of grassroots organizations protested at Philadelphia’s City Hall on Saturday afternoon, condemning the strikes and deposition of Maduro as an unconstitutional act of war.

“It’s clear we have a lawless president. Regardless of what you think of the Maduro regime, this is not the way we handle these things,” said David Gibson, co-director of Peace, Justice, Sustainability NOW! and one of the protest organizers. “This is gunboat diplomacy. It’s wrong. It risks war. Who knows how many people may have been hurt or killed who are innocent bystanders in Caracas.”

The attacks are “an illegal action, according to international law,” Gibson said.

“They’re calling it an arrest. We’re calling it a kidnapping,” he added.

Gibson said his group and others that have protested recent U.S. strikes on Venezuelan boats accused of trafficking narcotics are supporting legislation introduced in both the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate that would limit war powers.

Dems question legality, McCormick cheers successful mission

U.S. Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Montgomery County, told cable news outlet MSNOW she’s concerned the president has just started a war. She said the president cannot legally take over another country.

“We’re going to run a sovereign nation,” she said. “He does not have that unilateral authority.”

Dean and other members of Congress said they were unaware of Saturday’s military operation until Trump announced it in a social media post this morning. The president said Congress was kept in the dark because of worries it would leak.

Delaware’s congressional delegation, who are all Democrats, also condemned the lack of transparency, saying they were never told the administration wanted to topple Maduro’s rule.

“The President has unilaterally carried out armed conflict in the Caribbean and circumvented congressional approval, as required by the Constitution, because he knew that Congress would not support a senseless and short-sighted regime change ‘mission,’” Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester said in a statement. “They went so far as to lie to Congress during our recent briefings, saying that their priority was specifically not forceful regime change.”

Sen. Chris Coons, who is the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, and U.S. Rep. Sarah McBride said in statements that officials must immediately brief Congress on a clear strategy for what comes next.

“Our Constitution requires the administration to seek congressional approval, in the form of an Authorization for the Use of Military Force, before they take any further action to commit U.S. troops or take military strikes against Venezuela,” Coons said.

U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick, R-Pennsylvania, applauded Trump and the U.S. military for a “flawlessly executed mission to remove the illegitimate dictator Nicolas Maduro” in a post on X.

“For years Maduro’s regime killed our children by flooding America’s streets with poison, threatened our borders, and undermined U.S. national security,” he said. “I urge what’s left of the Maduro regime to honor the will of the Venezuelan people and transition peacefully to rightfully elected leadership.”

U.S. Sen John Fetterman, D-Pennsylvania, applauded the U.S. military’s execution of the operation.

“Grateful for our U.S. military personnel that handled these orders in Venezuela with precision,” he wrote in a post on X. “I maintain that we have the STRONGEST and MOST LETHAL military in the world—today proves that even more.”

Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Bucks County, offered a more nuanced response. Maduro is an “illegitimate narco-terror dictator,” Fitzpatrick said in a statement Saturday, whose “ouster and prosecution are long overdue.”

But, he said, “The only country that the United States of America should be ‘running’ is the United States of America.”

Fitzpatrick added, “The United States should join the international community in monitoring and overseeing a free and fair election in Venezuela, allowing the Venezuelan people a pathway to a true democracy.”

Democratic politicians from the Delaware Valley region criticized the attacks in social media posts Saturday.

U.S. Reps. Mary Gay Scanlon, D-Delaware County, and Chrissy Houlahan, D-Chester County, shared a post on X with a statement from Democratic Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, that called on the Trump administration to “immediately brief Congress on its plan to ensure stability in the region and its legal justification for this decision.”

U.S. Sen. Andy Kim, D-New Jersey, said in a post on X that “Trump rejected our Constitutionally required approval process for armed conflict.”

“This strike doesn’t represent strength,” Kim said. “It’s not sound foreign policy. It puts Americans at risk in Venezuela and the region, and it sends a horrible and disturbing signal to other powerful leaders across the globe that targeting a head of state is an acceptable policy for the U.S. government.”

See full article here.