In the hours after the Jan. 3 US invasion of Venezuela, social media was inundated with fake videos and images. Some showed Venezuelans holding huge rallies in favor of the US invasion. Others showed US troops landing or firing from helicopters. Others showed Maduro being kidnapped. Not all were AI. Some were old, showing anti-government rallies from years past. Or from other places—other invasions or bombing raids, unrelated to the current US attack. But these videos racked up tons of views, misleading millions of people about what was happening on the ground. Many of those people still don’t know the truth. It was only the tip of the iceberg. Today, host Michael Fox looks at the misconceptions, myths, and misinformation that has been spread about Venezuela in the wake of the US invasion and, together with political scientist Steve Ellner, dives headfirst into the biased reporting and slanted truths that have underpinned the mainstream narrative on Venezuela in recent weeks, years, and decades.  Under the Shadow is an investigative narrative podcast series that walks back in time, telling the story of the past by visiting momentous places in the present. Season 2 responds in real time to the Trump administration’s onslaught on Latin America. Hosted by Latin America-based journalist Michael Fox. This podcast is produced in partnership between The Real News Network and NACLA. Theme music by Monte Perdido and Michael Fox. Monte Perdido’s new album Ofrenda is now out. You can listen to the full album on Spotify, Deezer, Apple Music, YouTube or wherever you listen to music. Other music from Blue Dot Sessions. GuestsSteve EllnerTal Hagin Script editing by Heather GiesHosted, written, and produced by Michael Fox. Resources  X users and media outlets fact checking the wave of fake videos and images posted online following the January 3 US invasion of Venezuela: AI video Misinformation … Venezuela / great stuff – January 5 January 4 January 3 AP – Ouster of Venezuela’s Maduro unleashes waves of misinformation online Chavez Mausoleum  AI Images of Maduro Spread Rapidly, Despite Safeguards Fact Check: Viral Video of Maduro Arrest Celebration Is AI-Generated Under the Shadow You can check out the first season of Under the Shadow by clicking here The Beginning: Monroe And Migration | Under The Shadow, Episode 1 Panama. US Invasion. | Under The Shadow, Episode 13 The Legacy Of Monroe | Under The Shadow, Bonus Episode 4  Michael Fox’s recent reporting on the boat strikes and the ramp-up for war in Venezuela:  With the Strike on a “Drug-Carrying Boat,” Trump Returns to a Dangerous US Policy for Latin America Caribbean Leaders Call for Unified Latin American Resistance to US Attacks Trump’s Monroe Doctrine 2.0 Outlines Imperial Intentions for Latin America NACLA’s Curated Guide to the US Attack on Venezuela  Truthout’s ongoing reporting on War and Peace and the US invasion of Venezuela Visit TRNN for all of The Real News’s coverage on this and so much more. Support Under the ShadowPlease consider supporting this podcast and Michael Fox’s reporting on his Patreon account: patreon.com/mfox. There you can also see exclusive pictures, video, and interviews. You can check out Michael’s recent episode of Stories of Resistance about the protests against US intervention in Venezuela. Transcript The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. It will be updated. There’s this really powerful video that was posted to social media a couple of weeks ago… in the days following the U.S. invasion of Venezuela.  In it, huge crowds cheer in the streets. They wear Venezuelan colors, red, blue and yellow. An elderly woman is draped in the Venezuelan flag. She cries in front of the camera.  “The people are finally free,” says a voice off screen. “Thank you to the United States for freeing us. Long live freedom,” he says. In another clip in this video montage, the same elderly woman speaks to the camera in front of a sea of cheering people. “The Monster is gone,” she says. “We are finally free. Thank you, Donald Trump.” In another pair of clips, two separate bare-chested young men speak very similar words. One with a goatee cheers into the camera as he walks with a crowd…  “The dictator has finally fallen,” he shouts. “This is real.” But it’s not real. The video is fake. AI generated. You can tell from the glitches and the inconsistencies in the Venezuelan flag. But as of the day after the invasion, one post of that video on X had been retweeted 38,000 times, including by Elon Musk. It had 115,000 likes and 3.6 million views. This was just one of countless examples of viral content shared in the hours and days following the U.S. invasion of Venezuela that was false, manipulated, or AI generated. Like that picture you probably saw of Maduro’s capture. He’s flanked by two U.S. soldiers in camo gear. One with a patch of the American flag. The other with DEA written on his chest. Yeah, that was fake, too. AI generated.  “It seemed like a lot of people were kind of awakened to the reality that this has been happening for a long time. What happened in Venezuela was a crisis. Any crisis brings with it a lack of information. And when there’s a lack of information, that vacuum needs to be filled. And that’s filled by whatever people can latch onto.” Tal Hagin is a media literacy educator and an AI-fact checking watchdog on social media.  “And if people are telling you that Maduro was captured, then what do they want to see? a photo of Maduro captured. And so people are going to supply that for you. And so that what happened is an AI creator made an image of Maduro captured. He didn’t say that it was real. He also didn’t say that it was fake. And you just spread it online. And that that went like wildfire all over the internet. I was able to track down the original person who uploaded it and was able to prove that it was AI generated.” Tal says much of the fake content like this that was created and spread online following the U.S. invasion was done by people trying to rack up views, clicks, likes and followers. Influencers trying to capitalize on the media frenzy. And other fake content came from people with a political goal of influencing opinions or… individuals who were simply in support of what had occurred in Venezuela against Maduro. So they were trying to exemplify what had happened against him.” There were countless images like this.  Like a picture showing Hugo Chavez’s mausoleum in rubble. Tal was able to prove that one too was a fake. And there were many, many more videos. Videos showing huge rallies in favor of the U.S. invasion. Videos showing U.S. troops landing or firing from helicopters. Images showing Maduro’s kidnapping.  Not all were AI. Some were old, showing anti-government rallies from years past, for instance. Or from other places — other invasions or bombing raids, unrelated to the January 3rd U.S. attack on Venezuela. But these videos racked up tons of views, misleading millions of people about what was happening on the ground inside Venezuela. Many of those people still don’t know the truth. Here’s another example. A crowd of people cheer and cry in a packed street. Their hands are raised. Voices shout: “The dictatorship’s over. Venezuela is free.” This one is, of course, also AI. In fact, it was reportedly created and originally shared by an Instagram account whose bio states that it only uploads AI videos. But then the video was reshared by an influencer on TikTok with 80,000 followers. Her title read, “What the mainstream media won’t show you.” In other words, she insinuates the video is real. That Venezuelans poured into the streets to applaud the U.S. invasion and Maduro’s kidnapping. Her video is still up — and it has thousands of likes.  Most of these videos and photos are still up… boosting the narrative that Venezuelans in Venezuela support the U.S. invasion. A line that the Trump administration is happy to have catch fire online. But in reality… the exact opposite was true.  As the bombs fell on Caracas…. People were terrified. And by the next morning…  Maduro supporters had hit the streets to protest against the invasion. Not in favor of it.  Those protests have continued over the weeks since.  Unions and workers marched in a large rally in the middle of January. That is not to say that some Venezuelans haven’t celebrated Maduro’s kidnapping. Particularly abroad. That’s the sound of a march of Venezuelans in Quito, Ecuador. But in Venezuela, mass crowds haven’t hit the streets to applaud the U.S. invasion.  It’s an example of just one of the misconceptions, myths, and misinformation that has been spread about Venezuela in the wake of the U.S. invasion. And today, I’m going to dive headfirst into the biased reporting and slanted truths that have underpinned the mainstream narrative on Venezuela in recent weeks, years, and decades.  That…. In a minute.  This is Under the Shadow — an investigative narrative podcast series that looks at the role of the United States abroad, in the past and the very present. This podcast is a co-production in partnership with The Real News and NACLA. I’m your host, Michael Fox — longtime radio reporter, editor, journalist. The producer and host of the podcasts Brazil on Fire and Stories of Resistance. I’ve spent the better part of the last 20 years in Latin America. I’ve seen firsthand the role of the US government abroad. And most often, sadly, it is not for the better: Invasions, coups, sanctions. Support for authoritarian regimes. Politically and economically, the United States has cast a long shadow over Latin America for the past 200 years. It still does. This is Season 2 of Under the Shadow: Trump’s Attack. If you listened to Season 1 about the US role in Central America, you know that in each episode I take you to a location where something historic happened, diving into the past to try and decipher what it means today. I’ll still do that here. But Season 2 is also going to be a little different. Because my goal is to respond in real time to the Trump administration’s onslaught in Latin America. Just in recent months, we’ve seen the boat strikes, threats, the seizure of multiple tankers carrying Venezuelan crude, US intervention in the Honduran election, tariff war, the U.S. invasion of Venezuela and the threat of U.S. attacks on several of Venezuela’s neighbors.  That’s not to mention everything happening IN the United States. The ICE raids have detained tens of thousands of people. And they’ve largely targeted Latin American workers and families, among other immigrant groups. In this podcast series, I look at it all. I walk back in time to understand the present.  Today…. I’m going to take a deep dive into the myths, the lies, the misinformation and disinformation spread about Venezuela… past and present.  This is Episode 4 — Debunking Venezuela. Before I begin today, I should probably say that I first began reporting on Venezuela more than 20 years ago. In large part, I wanted to report about the country, because international coverage was so biased… it largely ignored the realities on the ground, in particular….  for the poorest, working class Venezuelans… Instead international news outlets dedicated page after page of newsprint to the so-called battle between then U.S. president George W. Bush and Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.  Fast-forward to today. It’s still the same story. Just the names have changed. Now, it’s Trump versus Maduro. And it’s gotten way more violent. The threats of years past have become reality. Meanwhile, everyday Venezuelans are relegated to the sidelines. Ignored and portrayed as pawns. That’s why I co-authored a book back in 2010 called Venezuela Speaks! It’s also why I’ll be spending the entire next episode speaking with folks on the ground about how they have been impacted by the U.S. invasion. What they experienced. What they felt. And what it means now. But today, I want to dissect some of the most common tropes and misinformation that’s spread about Venezuela. Not just the fake news or AI images online. But also the entire mainstream media narrative about Venezuela over the last 20 years… going back to the beginning of the government of Hugo Chavez, president Nicolas Maduro’s predecessor. I think it’s fascinating that this line… that since the late 1990s, Venezuela has been a dictatorship, that kicked out foreign oil companies and ran oil production into the ground… well it isn’t just pushed by right-wing outlets like Fox News or even mainstream outlets like the New York Times. It’s shared and reinforced by people who are genuinely trying to do their best to set the record straight. Let me just give you an example. A friend sent me this video.  It was posted by someone on TikTok with millions of followers. She does these viral videos in front of a chalk board. I’m not going to mention her handle, because to be honest… I really like what she does. She’s good. I get why she has a lot of followers. She’s funny. She’s witty. She’s scrappy. I watched several of her videos. It’s clear that she herself is trying to debunk mainstream narratives and get at the real motives behind Trump’s invasion of Venezuela or whatever she’s talking about. But when it came to Venezuela, in this video, she made many of the same mistakes we’ve heard over and over again. She said former president Hugo Chavez was a dictator. He was actually reelected in numerous certified free and fair elections. She said he nationalized the country’s oil in the mid 2000s. It was actually nationalized in the 1970s, decades before Chavez and Maduro. And this isn’t just nuance. This is really important to Trump’s myths about Venezuela…. his justifications for his invasion and the threats he continues to hold over the country, today. Remember that Maduro’s former vice president, Delcy Rodriguez is now leading the country as interim president. But she’s been making concessions to Trump as the U.S. president has promised to invade again if she gets out of line. Anyway… mythis point is this… this influencer’s TikTok video on Venezuela… it has more than 20 million views — 20 million. And… look. She did get some things right: That Trump’s invasion was about money and, of course, oil. She even got into U.S. funding for opposition groups in Venezuela, including one founded by opposition leader Marina Corina Machado, who won the  Nobel Peace Prize last year for her fight to overthrow the Venezuelan government. But she still repeated the same narrative that’s been repeatedly drilled into us. And hers was only one of numerous videos like this posted online in recent weeks. And so… in an effort to untangle the truth from the lies and the misinformation,… I reached out to Steve Ellner. “I arrived in Venezuela in 1975 to do research for my PhD dissertation. It was on organized labor in Venezuela from 1936 to 1948. I ended up staying teaching at the Universidad de Oriente in Puerto La Cruz in the Eastern part of Venezuela.”  He would teach at that university for roughly the next fifty years, until 2018. Today, he’s an associate managing editor of the journal of Latin American Perspectives. His focus is on Latin American politics, and of course, Venezuela.  I have spoken with him twice since the U.S. invasion at the beginning of this month. My interview with him is taken from those conversations. MICHAEL FOX: Let me just say again, Steve, thank you so much for joining me. I really appreciate it. So, I’ve been seeing a lot of videos online of people, supposed experts saying that they are going to explain in three minutes what’s going on in Venezuela. And then it ends up that they end up just repeating the same kind of mainstream narratives about Venezuela, saying that Chavez was a dictator, that Chavez stole the oil, and that’s why the United States is now invading. Have you been seeing this, and why do these narratives persist? STEVE ELLNER: Yeah, I’ve certainly seen it and I’ve polemicized with it. And it’s not only people who know little about Venezuela. I mean, there are academics who know a lot about Venezuela who are saying things along similar lines. And there’s this… feeling this urge on the part of the people who write about Venezuela talk about Venezuela to have to say each time they they they make reference to Maduro, to call him a dictator, or to make sure that they clearly indicate that they realize that Venezuela, the Venezuelan government under Maduro was repressive. Sometimes they compare Maduro with Chavez, other times they say both Maduro and Chavez were repressive. And, this comes from the media because the media every time they refer to Maduro, they call him dictator, dictator. Every time. I did a Google check to see whether they had the same policy towards a Sisi in Egypt, who is the most repressive leader. It’s the most repressive government in the history of that country. And they don’t do that. They don’t do that if we go to Saudi Arabia. They call Saudi Arabia a kingdom, not a dictatorship. So that in itself is deceptive. The other aspect of that, Mike, is that there is not a recognition of the relationship between the war… what I call the war in Venezuela that goes back to Chavez, but was really intensified under Maduro,  with the Guarimba, with the assassination attempts, with the use of drones, the paramilitary invasion from Colombia, the recognition of Juan Guaido, the intensification of the sanctions.  So there’s a relationship between that and the democracy that exists in Venezuela. War and democracy are incompatible. There’s no question about it. I mean, history bears that out. It was the case during World War I. It was the case during World War II. And this war in Venezuela has really limited options so that when we’re talking about the Venezuelan government, okay, there has been situations of repressive activity. There’s also been violence employed by the opposition or sectors of the opposition. So it’s more complicated than that. But this urge to say,  every time they talk, they make reference to Maduro, or every time they begin to talk about the Venezuelan situation, they feel compelled to indicate that they realize that Venezuela is not democratic or not as democratic as it was under Chavez, etc. So I think that’s deceptive because it’s not contextualizing what’s really taking place and what’s taken place in Venezuela practically since Chavez first came to office in 1999. The second thing is that The New York Times and other centrist media are making reference to the colectivos in Venezuela. They paint a picture that Maduro maintained himself in power because of some kind of alliance with guerrillas on the border, the Colombian guerrillas, the ex-FARC combatants, and the ELN, which spilled over to Venezuela. The colectivos, which are referred to practically as paramilitary groups that Diosdaro Cabello supposedly controls. MICHAEL FOX: Diosdado Cabello has long been a top official in the Venezuelan government. Currently he’s minister of interior. The colectivos are these pro-Chavez community groups that are sometimes armed. STEVE ELLNER: And so that that also gives the impression that Maduro maintained himself in power through repression, basically, through fear. But the fact of the matter is that what happened on January 3rd is a demonstration that the narrative that the media bought into and the narrative that Maria Corina Machado is still articulating is that narrative is completely false.  Maria Corina Machado just yesterday, or at least like I heard her yesterday speaking. She was invited by the by the Heritage Foundation out of all people. And she talked about what January 3rd represented. It represented, according to her, the triumph of the Venezuelan people, a demonstration that the Venezuelan people are united against dictatorship. It was a victory for this commitment on the part of her group and support on the part of the vast majority of the Venezuelans for democracy, which means, in effect, the rule of Maria Corina Machado and Edmundo Gonzalez. But the fact of the matter is that what the media anticipated in the first couple of days there was that there’d be some kind of uprising, some kind of movement, mobilization inspired by U.S. intervention in Venezuela. And that didn’t take place at all. Not at all. There was no mobilization, or very little mobilization on the part of the opposition. And in contrast, the government, the Chavista government, and Delcy Rodríguez in particular, they mobilized their people in demanding the release of Maduro and the First Lady, Cilia Flores, demanding that the United States stay out of Venezuela. These mobilizations were fairly massive. So the contrast between the inability of the radical opposition to mobilize their people… on the one hand, the contrast between that and the ability of the Chavistas to mobilize their people in support of Celia Flores and Nicolás Maduro is quite stark. It demonstrates that that narrative that Machado has the support of the vast majority of Venezuelans is completely false. MICHAEL FOX: Steve, I cannot let pass this moment without mentioning Machado’s visit to the White House, where she handed over, as she said she was going to, she handed over her Nobel Peace Prize to Trump. What is your what is your take on this? STEVE ELLNER: It’s really pathetic when you when you consider it. And that she is using this in order to bolster her position, I mean, her hope is obviously she is not satisfied and sectors of the opposition have stated and right-wingers here in the United States have also stated that it’s unfortunate that Trump didn’t go full-fledged in ousting the Chavistas from power. But this is obviously what she wants. And so she’s using this so-called peace prize in order to further her interests, which are political, her interests are to have Trump remove Delcy Rodriguez from power and so that you know her people can return to Venezuela and take over the government. So it’s quite you know cynical on her part, this symbolic move of handing over the Peace Prize to Trump in order to further her interests.  MICHAEL FOX: Steve, I’ve been seeing some stuff about members of the opposition who have come out, who maybe don’t like Maduro, but they’ve come out denouncing the invasion. Have you seen anything like to that extent? Because obviously we’ve also seen people in particularly Venezuelans abroad celebrating Trump’s maneuvers. I mean, obviously Maria Corina Machado, but also other people. But have you seen very much of like, do we know where the opposition stance is? I’m sure it’s divided, but in in terms of the actual US invasion itself. STEVE ELLNER: The fact that Capriles criticized, maybe not in, is not as adamantly,  as the Chavistas, but he criticized the US military presence of the Caribbean is an indication of where he stands. MICHAEL FOX: Capriles Radonski is a long-time member of the Venezuelan opposition. The former governor of the Venezuelan state of Miranda and a National Assembly representative.   STEVE ELLNER: And that’s extremely important because, in 2015, the opposition won those national assembly elections. And one of the reasons why they won is that they were united. That changed in 2020. And in the different political parties of the opposition split. In many of those cases, the government recognized a very small splinter group a few leaders that split off from then Voluntad Popular and Primero Justicia but for instance in the case of axnamoonenta from what I can see that was pretty thorough maybe fifty-fifty and the leader of the splitoff group.. verha bay gutierres yeah there’s a long time eighty li so. The opposition split in 2020, but the larger parties, the and and the leaders who are generally considered the main leaders of the opposition rallied in 2024, but shortly after that their position was the 24 elections, because it was Maria Corina Machado and Paulo Lopez and those people who supported abstenctionism up until 2023, late 2023, they were committed to participating in the elections. And so the opposition was pretty much united behind that idea. That changed after the July, 2024 elections. Capriles’s position was, we have to maintain a presence. and Machado, the hardline opposition, the radical opposition was opposed to that. When trump was elected and became president in 2025, his rhetoric against Venezuelans, his talk of the Tren de Aragua making a seem that the majority the Venezuelans in the United States are criminals or were crazy people because that’s what Trump is saying that Maduro let out these you know crazy people from the insane asylum and insane asylum and in senior sums and that he gave orders to basically invade the United States. So then,  a lot of people in Venezuela and a lot of Venezuelan immigrants felt that this was, a personal a personal affront. And so the division there was a division that went beyond electoral participation. So now you have a situation in which there are basically three blocks of the opposition. One is the hardliners, Maria Corina, who like you say, they are celebrating what took place on Saturday morning [the invasion].  That sector of the opposition that supported the candidacy of Edmundo Gonzalez, they’re the people who are in Venezuela. Capriles, Rosales, those people are in Venezuela. They’re involved in politics. Capriles was elected to the National Assembly. It’s a position that he’ll assume now in January. He becomes a national deputy. And in in others he’s not alone or a number of leaders who were elected in these elections last year so that that’s a second group a group that has broken with Machado and there they are there’s no question about it they are opposed to military action And the third group, which I mentioned before, was a group that with the mainstream opposition in 2020. They not only are opposed to the innovation, they, at least in the case of Gutierrez, who I just mentioned, who heads this faction of Accion Democratica, which historically has called on people to enlist in the militia MICHAEL FOX: Steve, I really want to hear your thoughts about kind of response to Trump’s take on oil. Because you’ve been, you’ve been in Venezuela since pretty much the very beginning when the nationalization started in the 1970s. And of course, Trump talks about,  they took our oil, they took our assets and we want it back. What’s the reality? You knowing the last,  five decades of of Venezuela and understanding that,  the Venezuelan policy towards oil, what is the reality of, of, of the relationship between the United States and oil in Venezuela and U S companies. STEVE ELLNER: Well, the reality is that policymakers in Washington under Trump are demonstrating that they don’t know about Latin America, and specifically Venezuelan reality. Maybe they don’t, they just don’t care about it. But the fact of the matter is that the legal tradition in Venezuela going back to Simon Bolivar to the oil companies so it’s factually incorrect to say that anything was taken from the oil companies in the first place. Because the narrative is these Venezuelans have ripped us off they have deceived us, they they brought us in we built these installations and then they kicked us out.  And, you know the media fact checks when there’s reference to the 2020 elections having been stolen or having been rigged, the media, know, the New York Times and other newspapers say the incorrect statement by Trump that the 2020  elections were stolen. I’ll give you one example.  I just read the New York Times today in which they stated that, Venezuelan had a democratic tradition up until Hugo Chavez. Venezuelan democracy, you had elections and then things changed under Chavez.  Well, that’s misleading. Now you could say, well, they’re not saying that Chavez rigged elections. Of course, they they’re implying that. They’re implying that you had honest and open elections up until 1998, or let’s say up until 1999 after Chavez came in, everything changed. That’s what they’re implying. And that’s not the case. Certainly with Chavez, that’s not the case. Nobody’s, well, practically nobody says that’s the case. Nobody’s serious. Maria Corina Machado said, they claimed that the recall election 2004 was rigged, but nobody took her seriously, except the United States, which refused to recognize those results. But Jimmy Carter was in Venezuela. I remember seeing him on TV and he stated clearly that those elections were were honest and there wasn’t any rigging. So in the 2024 elections in which,  the opposition claims that those elections were rigged. Okay, but they’re conflating that with all the previous elections, because there’s really no evidence that the elections of 2018 were rigged. Maduro won those elections after all. Most of the opposition didn’t participate in the elections and the main opposition candidate, Henry Falcón, wasn’t able to convince members of the opposition to vote for him. So, okay, they’re conflating that and they do this time and time again.  When they talk about the claim that the cartel de los solos. The New York Times knows full well… and if you ask me, Mike, to talk about that, my response will be, I don’t even know where to begin… there is so much evidence that that is a myth, that I’d have to structure my response because there’s so many things I could say. And The New York Times knows that. So I would say that the media is very misleading when it comes to Maduro. You have to take with a grain of salt anything that they say with regards to Venezuela. MICHAEL FOX: What have been for you some of the top things in which either the reporting is misinformed, it’s disinformed. What aren’t people getting right about Venezuela right now? STEVE ELLNER:  Well, firstly, one very important element that the media got wrong, and not only in the last couple of weeks since January 3rd, but going way back in time, Venezuela you know was was hit by a very, very serious economic crisis. And the narrative, which hasn’t changed, in fact, The New York Times yesterday had an article that discussed this that the corruption, the alleged corruption, and the alleged mismanagement, specifically of the oil industry, was responsible to a great extent for the economic difficulties that Venezuela was facing, the hyperinflation, which it faced,  in 2019, I don’t remember the exact dates when it began, but it continued for a couple of years management and then the sanctions were always thrown in as one of the factors. So somebody you know reading these articles might say, well, they’re given you know they’re basically saying 50% are due to the sanctions and 50% are due to the mismanagement. In yesterday’s article, it made it seem as if it was much more than 50%. That is, the mismanagement and the corruption were mainly responsible for the economic difficulties. Because the article stated that the sanctions were imposed in 2017 by trump. That was in August of 2017. But the economic downturn and the economy floundered beginning in like 2000, The fact of the matter is that there is all the evidence of the world to reach the conclusion that Venezuela’s economic difficulties were mainly due to the sanctions and the war on Venezuela and that the errors that were committed may have been overreactions to the the sanctions. Even the corruption, which you know obviously exists, existed in Venezuela as it exists all over the world for that matter but okay it was a problem in Venezuela…. But in my opinion, the sanctions are responsible for,  80, 85, 90% of the economic problems that Venezuela faced. So that’s one thing that the media got wrong And when the New York Times said yesterday in their article, and they’ve said it all along, that the sanctions were imposed in 2017, but the economic problems predated that, what they don’t say is two things. Firstly, the sharp decrease in oil prices, had a lot to do with the economic problems that really began in between 2015 and 2016. The oil prices also began to nosedive 2015, 2016. So that that’s part of the explanation. And the other part is that the sanctions predate 2017 because Obama imposed sanctions. They were individual sanctions on Venezuelans, but these this same executive decree which imposed the sanctions on individuals in the Maduro government called Venezuela a threat to US national security. And the reaction to that was that companies throughout the world were reluctant to have anything to do with Venezuela. Banks throughout the world were reluctant to do to have anything to do with Venezuela. U.S. companies pulled out of Venezuela. Kimberly Clark and Ford immediately pulled out of Venezuela after that executive decree. And then after that, Kellogg’s and General Motors and other companies pulled out of Venezuela. So that there’s no question about it that The New York Times is distorting reality by not indicating that sanctions were mainly responsible for the economic problems that Venezuela faced and has faced up until the present. MICHAEL FOX: Steve, there’s just one other thing I think is fascinating. I don’t know if you saw this clip.  Trump met with oil executives, I guess, about a week ago. And the narrative about oil is that,  the government has run the oil industry into the ground, that all of the that basically it kicked out all of the foreign oil companies. and And when Trump was meeting with them, there’s this incredible clip online in which like the president or the director of Halliburton, Trump asks him, well, when did you leave? And he said, well, we left in 2019 because we were forced out because of the US sanctions. TRUMP: When did you leave Venezuela.  HALIBURTON EXEC: As a company, we left under the sanctions in 2019. So we had intended to stay and then when the sanctions went into place we were required to leave.” MICHAEL FOX: He said, we wanted to stay, but we weren’t allowed to say. So we packed up when those sanctions went into effect. And it was such a clear, kind of moment when you know the very director of Halliburton himself and all these other oil companies you know is saying, look, you know it was the United States that forced us out, not Venezuela. STEVE ELLNER: Yeah, that’s a good point. And it’s part of the narrative. And,  even though Halliburton is stating that explicitly, the fact of the matter is that Exxon and ConocoPhillips are saying something quite different. They’re saying that they were forced out, that the Venezuelan government kicked them out of Venezuela. And that that is false. That happened in 2007. after Chávez won the 2006 presidential elections by landslide, he modified the oil legislation, the Ley de Hidrocarburos 2001, He modified that in a number of ways. And Chevron accepted those new conditions. Exxon and ConocoPhillips didn’t. And so they left, but they left of their own accord. They weren’t expelled from Venezuela. And Venezuela has stated all along, more so under Maduro than under Chavez, that the you know foreign oil companies are welcome, but under the terms that the Venezuelan government establishes. So that,  this statement that the oil companies and the service companies, and as in the case of Halliburton, were expelled from Venezuela, that’s completely false. MICHAEL FOX: Steve, how do you see things in Venezuela right now? We’re a couple of weeks out from the invasion. What is your take of what the situation is kind of on the ground and the developments that we’ve seen with Trump selling oil now and the continuing U.S. detention of more tankers and so much other so many other things? STEVE ELLNER:  I would say that the best case scenario, which is not the most likely scenario, but the best case scenario for the and the government of Delcy Ramirez is that she just by time, that she provides Trump with enough concessions so that Trump can claim that this has been a total success, that the US has benefited from the kidnapping and that US oil companies are now exploiting the oil in order to deliver it to the United States. That Venezuela has now cut economic ties with China, although it doesn’t rule out the possibility of having Venezuelan oil go to China, but paid foreign dollars and not in Chinese currency or cryptocurrency. So, I mean, this is what he’s a boasting about. And if Delcy Rodriguez can just,  buy time in order to, bring about a gradual partial recovery in order to,  be able to provide the basics for the Venezuelan people, which is what Venezuela was doing and the situation was improving up until… the the blockade of Venezuela, if the you know if the situation can be more or less tolerable for the Venezuelan government and the Venezuelan people, hopefully the political situation here in the United States will change. This situation internationally will change. Focus will be redirected to other parts of the world. And maybe they’ll see Rodriguez will be left alone so that she can,  carry out the policies that she really considers to be the best policies for Venezuela. That’s the best case scenario. And I think that that’s what she’s banking on. The media, on the other hand, is stating either explicitly or implying, as the New York Times did yesterday and has done up until now, that there are serious divisions within the government. There accusations that there are traitors, that some people in the government, maybe even Delce Rodriguez herself, had been in cahoots with the Trump administration prior to January 3rd. And the assumption there is everybody is out for themselves. She was vice president. She wanted to become president. And that’s what people all about. That’s the under underlying assumption. But that completely ignores her trajectory. She’s dedicated her whole life to a cause. And she also is the daughter of a martyr who was tortured and killed at the hands of the government that Chavez attempted to overthrow by force and then replaced through elections in 1998. So that that’s completely that narrative is completely false with regard to her And there’s absolutely no proof that the government is divided. In fact, the government, the Chavista movement has been united ever since Chavez passed away.  There was all kinds of speculation. I remember this clearly, that in 2013, when Chavez died, there was all this speculation, and I would say hope, that there’d be a clash between Diosdado Cabello and Nicolás Maduro, who represent, the two of them represented tendencies or currents, or you might even call them factions within the Chavista movement, like something that exists in all political movements, in all political parties. You have different currents. And there was a hope that there’d be a clash between the two of them. And that didn’t happen at all. And there’s no evidence, really, at least there’s no hard evidence that this is taking place now. But,  the article in the New York Times yesterday talked about how the people in the street, the Chavises who are in the street, some people who were interviewed were,  outraged by the kidnapping of the president the and the first lady. And that seems to contradict the what Delcy Rodriguez is doing in terms of, talking to representatives, including the head of the CIA, Radcliffe, who who went to Venezuela to talk to Delcy Rodriguez. So the implication of the article is,  you have two different things going on. Some people, are resentful, that the president of the country was kidnapped along with the first lady. And here the current president is negotiating with people who kidnapped the president and the first lady. that that That implication is deceptive because both things are happening, including Delcia Rodriguez has stated in her speeches that what happened on January 3rd was atrocious. There’s no legal basis for it. And she demands the immediate release of Maduro and Flores. That doesn’t contradict her talks with with Trump, she really doesn’t have any option. And she stated that. We have no options at this point. We’ve got a gun pointed at us, and you know what else can we do? So that there’s really no contradiction there, as The New York Times is implying and other newspapers are stating explicitly. MICHAEL FOX: Steve, thank you so much again. I really, really appreciate it. STEVE ELLNER: Sure, Mike, anytime. ### That is all for this episode of Under the Shadow.  Next time, we go to the streets of Venezuela to see the true impact of the US invasion. We hear from people on the ground. We see the true cost of this chapter of the U.S. war on Venezuela. That’s next time on Under the Shadow.  I’m your host Michael Fox.  I hope you enjoyed today’s episode. A couple of things to mention. First, if you are looking for more information, news and reporting on Trump’s onslaught, both on communities within the United States and abroad… please check out The Real News and NACLA. Both of them are publishing daily indispensable reporting. In fact, NACLA has created a Curated Guide to the US Invasion of Venezuela. That includes this podcast. I’ll add links to it all in the show notes. Second, if you are new to this podcast series, you might want to consider checking out the first season of Under the Shadow. It looks at US intervention in Central America, in particular throughout the 1980s. I highly recommend you go back and give it a listen. It’s still super relevant today. I’ll add links in the show notes or you can find that by searching for Under the Shadow wherever you get your podcasts.  Finally, if you like what you hear, please head over to my Patreon page: Patreon.com/mfox. There you can support my work, become a monthly sustainer, or sign up to stay abreast of the latest on this podcast and my other reporting across Latin America. This really helps me to continue to do this important work. Under the Shadow is a co-production of The Real News and NACLA. This episode script was edited by Heather Gies. Thanks for listening. See you next time.  ...read more read less