María Corina Machado, Venezuela’s Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Opposition leader, has declared her intention to share the honour with US President Donald Trump, days after American forces toppled longtime strongman Nicolás Maduro, even as Trump dismissed her political prospects.
Speaking to Fox News on Monday, January 5, Machado described ouster of Maduro as “a huge step for humanity, for freedom and human dignity,” positioning the US-led operation as a watershed moment.
The 58-year-old had already partially dedicated her October prize to Trump when she received it, but she has now doubled down on that gesture.
“I certainly would love to be able to personally tell him that we believe, the Venezuelan people, because this is a prize of the Venezuelan people, certainly want to give it to him, and share it with him,” Machado told host Sean Hannity.
Despite her public overtures, Machado revealed she has not spoken with Trump since October 10, the day her Nobel win was announced, when the President called to congratulate her.
However, Trump said that Machado lacks the standing to lead Venezuela. “She doesn’t have the support or the respect within the country,” Trump said, adding, “She’s a very nice woman, but she doesn’t have the respect.”
Instead of backing Machado or Opposition candidate Edmundo González, widely believed to have won last year’s presidential election according to polling station tallies, the Trump administration has thrown conditional support behind Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s former Vice-President.
Rodríguez was sworn in as interim president on Monday, January 5, even as she condemned what she called the “kidnapping” of Maduro, who now faces narco-terrorism charges in a New York courtroom.
Machado has spent more than a year in hiding after being briefly detained at an anti-government protest in Caracas last January, emerging only briefly in December to accept her Nobel Prize in Oslo.
The Opposition leader said she plans to return to Venezuela “as soon as possible,” though the political landscape remains fluid as the country navigates its first power transition in over a decade without clear consensus on who should govern.
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