On Jan. 6, 2025, four members of Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado’s team piled onto a couch in a Capitol Hill office, across from Mike Waltz, who was soon to become Donald Trump’s national security adviser. Machado made a cameo via video call from her hideout in Venezuela.
During the meeting, David Smolansky, who runs Machado’s office in Washington, explained how Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua was controlled by Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, according to two people present who described the meeting. Waltz scribbled notes the whole time, they said. The meeting, details of which have not been previously reported, was part of a high-stakes gamble by Nobel Peace Prize-winner Machado to align with hawks in the Trump team who argue that Maduro — through links to criminal gangs — represents a direct threat to U.S. national security, despite U.S. intelligence reports casting doubt on that view.
Conversations with more than 50 sources — including former and current U.S. officials, members of the Venezuelan opposition and informants to U.S. security agencies — provide new details about efforts by members of Machado’s team to help the Trump administration build the case for an aggressive stance against the Venezuelan government, despite worries about blowback from Trump’s policies on Venezuelan immigrants living in the United States.
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