Now that the United States has extracted Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela, it might help to consider four precedents. No event of the moment is exactly like any episode in the past. But in recalling history, we can see elements of the present that will otherwise be shrouded by propaganda or emotion.
1. American intervention in Latin America. Throughout the cold war, and indeed long before, the United States has intervened in Central and South America, asserting an implicit right to choose leaders. Sometimes these interventions were designed to reverse the outcome of elections, replacing the elected leader or government with people favored in Washington.
During the cold war, such operations were covered by a pro-democracy propaganda cloak, the logic being that whatever the United States did must have been to stop communism, and communism was anti-democratic.
This time around, there is no pretense that the goal is democracy. Nicolás Maduro and his allies stole the 2024 Venezuelan election, but that very real crime is not what the Trump people are punishing: the Trumpists prefer the essentially fictional concept of “narco-terrorism.” Venezuela has a legitimately elected president: Edmundo González. There is no sign that he figures in Trump’s plans Trump dismisses the courageous activist María Machado, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, as “a nice woman” who lacks popular support. (This is after she dedicated the Prize to him — it is important to remember the golden rule of dealing with Trump: he will always disappoint you.)
In light of the open US extraction of Maduro in January 2026, it is also worth revisiting the American-backed extraction of María Machado herself in December 2025, just four weeks ago. At the time this appeared to be a move designed to help her appear in Norway for the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony. At the moment, it looks much more like an American attempt to remove a rival for power and clear the way for an American imperialism directed not so much against Maduro as against Venezuelans as a people.
Yet the imperialism does not seem to be very well considered. In the past, American governments chose leaders in Latin America who would support the interests of American companies. On the surface, the same thing appears to be happening here. Trump is offering Venezuela’s oil to American companies, and the money to be made as an explanation for the whole operation. But there is little profit in Venezuelan oil in the short run; huge investments would be necessary in the long run. This would in turn require political stability. It does seem, at first glance, that the oil companies believe in this.
There is much to be said for democracy. One of the powerful arguments in its favor is continuity: that it offers a chance to move on from a calamity. The obvious thing to do now in Venezuela would be to hold elections.
2. The Second Iraq War. The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a turning point for American power and principle. It killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. It was based upon lies, which undermined American credibility and weakened American influence. It absorbed huge amounts of American money and attention, creating a window of opportunity for China ro climb to global prominence.
Donald Trump says Nicolás Maduro and wife will be taken to New York after being captured during US attack on Venezuela
Donald Trump has saidthe US “captured” Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flew them out of the South American country during a pre-dawn assault on Caracas and the surrounding region.
“It was a brilliant operation, actually,” the US president told the New York Times after witnesses in Venezuela reported a series of explosions. “A lot of good planning and [a] lot of great, great troops and great people.”
The US attorney general, Pam Bondi, said the couple would face criminal charges and trial in the US based on a 2020 New York indictment. In a social media post, she said they would “soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts”. [ . . . ]
Today the White House announced that President Joe Biden will visit the Middle East next month. His first stop will be in Israel, and then he will go to Saudi Arabia, where he will meet with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), the man responsible for the murder and dismemberment of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. MBS recently invested $2 billion in Jared Kushner’s new investment fund against the advice of the funds’ advisors.
In 2019, Biden promised to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” in part because of the Khashoggi killing, but administration officials have been quietly visiting for months, in part to urge Saudi Arabia to increase oil production to help ease gas prices in the U.S. While the White House maintains that it is looking for a “reset” with the Saudis in order to promote peace talks between Israel and Palestine, end the war in Yemen, and address human rights violations, it acknowledges that oil production is on the table.
Inflation is high in the U.S., as it is all over the world, because of demand, supply chain problems, the soaring costs of transportation as the world’s few carriers jack up prices, and so on. But that inflation is driven in large part by higher oil prices, which have driven up the price of gasoline and diesel in the U.S., which in turn makes everything more expensive.
Since the first public hearing of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol last week, much of the traffic on right-wing social media has been about gas prices, blaming them on President Biden. Republicans see gas prices and inflation as key issues both to distract from the hearings and to enable Republicans to take over control of Congress in the November midterm elections.
In fact, according to a piece by E. Rosalie in the newsletter Hoaxlines, U.S. production of crude oil during Biden’s first year was actually higher than it was in Trump’s first year. To encourage production, Biden’s officials have issued more permits on federal lands than were issued in the Trump administration’s first three years, at a pace that approaches that of George W. Bush’s administration. Only 10% of all U.S. drilling takes place on federal land, but the Bureau of Land Management confirms that more than 9000 drilling permits on public land are currently approved. Not all would be productive if they were developed, and none of them could start producing immediately, but this undercuts the argument that gas prices are high because the Biden administration has choked off permits.
Russia’s war on Ukraine has also driven up global oil prices, but the U.S. gets less than 2% of its oil from Russia.
What appears to be driving U.S. gas prices is the pressure investors are putting on oil companies, whose officers answer to their investors. Limited production creates higher prices that are driving record profits. In a March 2022 survey of 141 U.S. oil producers asking them why they were holding back production, 59% said they were under investor pressure. Only 6% blamed “government regulations” for their lack of increased production.
Oil companies are seeing huge profits and are using the money for stock buybacks to raise stock prices. BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron, TotalEnergies, Eni, and Equinor will give between $38 and $41 billion to shareholders through buyback programs this year. As EOG Resources wrote to its shareholders: “2021 was a record-setting year for EOG. We earned record net income of $4.7 billion, generated a record $5.5 billion of free cash flow, which funded record cash return of $2.7 billion to shareholders. We doubled our regular dividend rate and paid two special dividends, paying out about 30% of cash from operations…. This period of high oil prices allows us to further bolster the balance sheet. To support our renewed $5 billion buyback authorization and prepare to take advantage of other countercyclical opportunities, we plan to build and carry a higher cash balance going forward….”
But congressional Republicans appear uninterested in adjusting the disjunction between supply and demand that is creating such high consumer prices. In May the House passed the Consumer Fuel Price Gouging Prevention Act by a vote of 217 to 207 with only Democrats in the yes column and all Republicans and four Democrats voting no. The bill provided a vague warning that it is unlawful to charge “unconscionably excessive” prices for consumer fuel during presidentially declared energy emergencies, and it gave the Federal Trade Commission more power to punish price gouging.
The Senate has not moved forward with the bill. Republicans there can kill it with the filibuster and will do so, despite the fact that a Morning Consult/Politico poll shows that 77% of registered voters—including 76% of Republicans—like such a measure. Only 13% of voters outright oppose such a law (10% have no opinion).
Biden has sought to address the issue with the tools at his command. After trying to ease pressure by releasing oil from the strategic reserve, he has set out to reduce the nation’s demand for oil products by identifying the conversion to clean energy as a national security issue. On June 6 he vowed to “continue…pushing Congress to pass clean energy investments and tax cuts” but also authorized the use of the Defense Production Act to speed up the domestic production of solar panel parts, building insulation, heat pumps, and power grid infrastructure like transformers. He will also lower tariffs on solar technology coming to the U.S. from Southeast Asia for two years. These measures should ensure a reliable supply of solar panels while creating more jobs in the green energy sector, which currently employs more than 230,000 people in the solar industry alone.
In addition to Biden’s measures to ease oil prices, lawmakers are trying to curb inflation by imposing the sorts of limits on carrier prices that they refuse to on oil prices.
On Monday the House passed the Ocean Shipping Reform Act of 2022 to hamper unfair business practices among shipping carriers. The measure passed the Senate in March. Although the bills were introduced by Democrats, the votes that passed them were bipartisan, reflecting, perhaps, that the nine shipping companies that dominate the world market are multinational rather than domestic. According to Representative John Garamendi (D-CA), shippers have raised prices on U.S. businesses and consumers by more than 1000% on goods coming from Asia, enabling them to make $190 billion in profits last year, a sevenfold increase in one year. This bill, he said, “will help crush inflation and protect American jobs.” Biden has praised the bill and promises to sign it.
And tomorrow the Federal Reserve is expected to announce an interest rate hike of three quarters of a percentage point, its highest since 1994, to combat inflation. Higher interest rates will make it more expensive to borrow money, which should cool down the economy, although getting inflation down to the 2% the Fed prefers will likely slow consumer spending, dampen wage increases, and slow economic growth.
And of course, next month, Biden will visit the Saudis, who can increase oil supplies quickly if they believe it is in their best interest to do so.
And finally, a heads up: tomorrow’s hearing of the January 6 committee has been postponed. The next hearing is now scheduled for Thursday at 1:00 pm.
