Yesterday, Delcy Rodríguez became the first-ever female head of state of Venezuela. However, what might otherwise have been celebrated as an historic milestone in a country known for its male-dominated, militarized power structures, was overshadowed by the unprecedented events that led to her promotion.
Until last week, Rodríguez, 56, was Venezuela’s vice president, a role that she has held since 2018. So trusted was she by Nicholás Maduro, the country’s ousted president who is currently detained in a New York City jail on charges related to alleged drug trafficking and weapons, that she simultaneously held additional roles, including minister of economy and finance and minister of petroleum. It’s her mastery of the latter, it has been reported, that led President Trump to select Rodríguez as Maduro’s replacement—for the time being, at least. (At her swearing in, she was announced as “interim president.”)
Some have expressed surprise that Trump didn’t choose María Corina Machado, Venezuela’s Nobel Peace Prize winning opposition leader, to run the country in Maduro’s absence. After all, Machado, 58, an anti-socialist advocate of economic liberalism, has repeatedly praised the U.S. government’s campaign against Maduro and even dedicated her Nobel prize to Trump in October of last year. Surely she would have been a safe bet to advance the U.S.’s goals in the country, which include rebuilding its oil industry under American influence? Not according to Trump who, in recent days, has dismissed Machado as a “nice woman” who “doesn’t have the respect to be a leader.” Whatever your politics, it’s an interesting description for a woman who won the presidential opposition primary in 2024 and was then blocked from running by the Maduro government.
