Venezuela Archives - Public Seminar

Podcast

The Trump Administration’s War on Venezuelan Migrants

Season 2: Episode 1

October 24, 2025 • by T. Alexander Aleinikoff, Hiroshi Motomura and Cristina M Rodríguez

Jonathan Blitzer, staff writer for The New Yorker, discusses his recent article “Enemies of the State: How the Trump Administration declared war on Venezuelan migrants in the US.” In telling the story of a Venezuelan couple living in Chicago, one of whom was sent to CECOT, the notorious prison in El Salvador, and one ...

The Trump Administration’s War on Venezuelan Migrants

Latin America & Caribbean

The Working-Class Venezuelans at the Center of Trump’s “Crisis”

Xenophobic rhetoric divides immigrant communities

May 2, 2025 • by Erick Moreno Superlano

Alex was trembling when he entered the café. He had agreed to participate in my research on Venezuelan immigration in New York and we had decided to discuss his story over coffee. But as he walked down the street to meet me, an ICE van had pulled over and parked ...

The Working-Class Venezuelans at the Center of Trump’s “Crisis”

Activism

How Venezuelans Reclaimed Their Communes

Chris Gilbert’s Commune or Nothing! places Venezuela’s communal movement as a key moment of working-class self-emancipation

March 6, 2025 • by Gant Roberson

In the central western region of Venezuela, a vast scenery of fertile land blends with the llanero (herdsman) culture of the people of Simón Planas township. Adults make use of children's bicycles (received as Christmas gifts from the government) to meet the exigencies of day-to-day life, evoking “a forgotten episode ...

How Venezuelans Reclaimed Their Communes

Democracy

Venezuelans Battle a Crumbling Democracy and a Stolen Election

How a revolution ignites

September 17, 2024 • by Alexandra Panzarelli

Highly charged protests continue to erupt in Venezuela following President Nicolás Maduro's blatantly forged electoral results at the end of July. The US and 10 Latin American states have rejected Maduro's unsubstantiated vote certification. But rather than face mounting pressure from the opposition to release evidence of the votes behind ...

Venezuelans Battle a Crumbling Democracy and a Stolen Election

Economy

How Sanctions Contributed to Venezuela’s Economic Collapse

Despite claims that they targeted the Maduro regime, sanctions had indiscriminate effects on the country

January 17, 2023 • by Francisco Rodríguez

This essay was originally published by The Global Americans and is reprinted with permission During the past decade, Venezuela lived through the largest economic contraction documented in the history of the Western Hemisphere. The implosion took place at the same time as the U.S. government barred oil purchases, froze government bank ...

How Sanctions Contributed to Venezuela’s Economic Collapse

Activism

The Revolution Will Not Be Feminized

For all its socialist talk, Venezuela hasn’t done much to advance women’s rights

June 29, 2022 • by Cristina Ciordia, Venus Faddoul and Daniel Fermín

She was just thirteen. Nearly malnourished, she had dropped out of school. Her brain still developing, her self-esteem at its most vulnerable, she was raped, repeatedly, by a neighbor. She didn’t consent, she couldn’t have. She was just thirteen, and now she was pregnant. Her mother refused to let it be. ...

Activism

Breaking Through for LGBTQI Rights

Movements fighting homophobia and transphobia in Venezuela offer an example of organizing that successfully joins forces across ideological and partisan lines

May 16, 2022 • by Daniel Fermín, Richelle Briceño and Yendri Velásquez

We have to understand that the ones who are in these spaces are the ones who can create change, be it positive or negative....

Politics

The Perfect Dictatorship

The perfect dictatorship is not one in which there are no elections. The perfect dictatorship is one in which the government does not lose elections

June 2, 2021 • by Francisco Rodríguez

_____ It was during the presidency of Carlos Salinas de Gortari, whom many saw as one of the champions of economic reforms (even today, some people remember him that way), that Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa decided to break one of the unwritten rules of Mexican politics. In a televised discussion ...

Politics

The U.S. and UK Are a Wrecking Ball Crew Against the Pillars of Internationalism

They have undermined the sovereignty of nations and mutilated international law

July 13, 2020 • by Vijay Prashad

Ambassador Kelly Craft, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, spoke at the same meeting. She praised the charter and called upon the member states of the UN to bring its values into the world. However, Ambassador Craft said, “On far too many occasions, we have seen nations that are parties ...

The U.S. and UK Are a Wrecking Ball Crew Against the Pillars of Internationalism

Feature

Confrontation Over the Occupation of the Embassy of Venezuela

On April 10, three US left-wing groups occupied the Embassy of Venezuela in DC

May 8, 2019 • by Jo Freeman

On April 10, three US left-wing groups occupied the Embassy of Venezuela in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. at the invitation of the Maduro government. Calling themselves the Embassy Protection Collective (EPC), CodePink, ANSWER, and Popular Resistance are living at the embassy 24/7 to keep representatives of opposition leader ...

Confrontation Over the Occupation of the Embassy of Venezuela

Feature

Blackface, Venezuela, and Conversation Hearts

Past Present Episode 166

February 12, 2019 • by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, Nicole Hemmer and Neil J. Young

In this episode, Natalia, Niki, and Neil discuss the history of blackface, political upheaval in Venezuela, and the demise of Valentine’s Day conversation hearts. Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: Two top Virginia Democrats have admitted to wearing blackface. Natalia pointed to a recent Gucci turtleneck that many have ...

Blackface, Venezuela, and Conversation Hearts

Blue Monday

To Hell With Maduro and With Trump

Thoughts on Socialism, Venezuela, and Freedom

January 28, 2019 • by Jeffrey C. Isaac

The Venezuelan system has been in crisis for some time. This crisis, like all crises, is no doubt overdetermined. It has global, regional, and domestic dimensions. And its primary victims are the ordinary people of Venezuela. If you have any doubts, I recommend a look at Amnesty International’s 2018 report, ...