Shaking Maduro’s Inner Circle: Sanctioning Top Officials

By Sophie Ritzenthaler

On Thursday, September 12, the United States imposed sanctions on 16 Venezuelan officials who are closely aligned with President Nicolas Maduro for obstructing the results of the presidential election. These were judicial and elections officials who have been accused of aiding in certifying Maduro’s controversial win in Venezuela’s presidential election earlier this year. Along with the sanctions, The State Department has imposed new visa restrictions on a large number of officials aligned with Maduro who undermined the election process. U.S. officials say they believe that sanctions are “an important step in shaping the overall context of the political trajectory in Venezuela,” despite previous sanctions not accomplishing much against the Maduro regime. At this time the United States had acknowledged that Gonzalez was the candidate to receive the most votes on July 28, but have not officially recognized him as the president-elect of Venezuela. 

The United States, along with several countries in the West and Latin America have rejected the results of the presidential election earlier this year due to the lack of transparency of election results. Many have cited voter fraud as claims have been made that there was overwhelming evidence that the opposition candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, won the election. The National Electoral Council, which has been reported to be closely aligned with Maduro, claimed the incumbent president the winner of the election with 51 percent of the votes. Although the council made this claim, no breakdown of the results have been released like in years past. The opposition party was quick to refute the results citing Gonzalez had comfortably won based on voting data it had acquired. Protests erupted around the country following the election and as of September 9th, it was estimated around 1,658 people have been arrested so far in the opposition protest.