The Democratic Party: NO FRIEND OF VENEZUELA!
Venezuelans protesting Barack Obama’s devastating executive order that led to an imposed food crisis in Venezuela in 2015.
The current sanctions regime that has devastated Venezuela’s economy did not begin with Donald Trump. It was President Barack Obama who issued the notorious 2015 executive order absurdly declaring Venezuela an “extraordinary threat” to the national security of the United States. That decree laid the legal foundation for the sweeping sanctions that cut Venezuela off from global financial markets, restricted access to food and medicine, and weakened the nation’s ability to import even the most essential goods. When Trump later escalated these sanctions—blockading the Venezuelan oil industry and deepening the humanitarian crisis—the Democratic Party did nothing to stop it. Many leading Democrats openly applauded the recognition of Juan Guaidó and repeated the talking points of neoconservative regime-change strategists.
Long before Trump arrived on the scene, Democrats routinely backed funding for opposition groups, foreign NGOs, and media projects designed to undermine the Bolivarian process. Liberal activist NGO networks, including organizations associated with George Soros, have been working to destabilize Venezuela from within from the time Hugo Chávez took office in 1999 right up to today.
Despite this blatant reality, certain organizations in the U.S. are working hard to fold “Hands Off Venezuela!” activism into generic anti-Trump protests. The most prominent example was the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), which is working non-stop to turn a movement opposing a new war into a wing of the CNN-supported, pro-NATO “Stop Trump” hysteria. By framing the issue through a lens of Trump Derangement Syndrome, they robbed the movement of strategic clarity and cut it off from the very audiences that could influence policy.
The truth is that millions of Trump supporters are strongly opposed to war with Venezuela, and figures such as Rand Paul have publicly criticized calls for military intervention. Many conservative, libertarian, and populist voters express deep skepticism of regime-change wars. A genuinely effective anti-war movement would have recognized this and built a broad coalition that reached people across the political spectrum. PSL and the ANSWER Coalition give nothing to these Americans but their middle finger. When anti-war conservatives and libertarians joined with leftists like Chris Hedges and Dennis Kucinich in Washington, D.C., on February 19th, 2023, PSL voices labeled the “Rage Against the War Machine” protests “white nationalist” and “neo-Nazi.” This was not simply an insult or mischaracterization; it was a green light for violence against the rally and for government repression.
Intentional Misdirection of “Hands Off Venezuela!” Protests
PSL’s misdirection of the “Hands Off Venezuela!” protests could have real consequences. The U.S.A. has been building up forces in the Caribbean and attacking boats since August, but as of yet no strikes on the Venezuelan mainland have been conducted. It is clear that behind closed doors the Trump administration is divided on whether or not to attack. Marco Rubio, a Miami Cuban and neoconservative, clearly wants a new regime-change war. Tulsi Gabbard does not, and she is likely not alone.
One way to guarantee the “Hands Off Venezuela!” protests are ignored by the White House is to make them part of the mainstream, “No Kings!” Stop Trump hysterics. The main objection of Kamala Harris and the pro-NATO establishment to Trump is that he is not regime-change oriented enough. Hillary Clinton has condemned the new U.S. national security strategy for not being oriented enough toward “human rights” and foreign interventions.
Why does Brian Becker’s protest club focus on lining up behind and pandering to these people, while characterizing others who genuinely oppose attacks on Venezuela—such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson—as “fascists”? The answer can be found in a New York Times article from March 18th, 2007: “Brian Becker, the national coordinator of the Answer Coalition and a member of the Party of Socialism and Liberation, said the group held out little hope of influencing either the president or Congress. ‘It is about radicalizing people,’ Mr. Becker said in an interview. ‘You hook into a movement that exists…”
PSL does not really want to stop a new war against Venezuela. As Brian admitted, it’s about “radicalizing people,” i.e., creating divisions in America and recruiting people to join his fringe activist group.
The Center for Political Innovation rejects the idea that anti-imperialism must be filtered through one faction of the political establishment. The Venezuelan people do not need activists to run interference for the Democratic Party. They need a movement that says clearly: the sanctions are criminal, Venezuela has the right to national sovereignty, and the U.S. working class must not be dragged into another campaign of economic or military aggression.
Medea Benjamin has the right approach. She is calling for Marco Rubio—a corrupt neocon warmonger—to be fired and replaced with a less hawkish secretary of state. Her words echo Maduro himself, who offered sympathy to Trump after the attempted assassination in July of 2024 and has focused his condemnation of U.S. moves on Rubio, not the entire administration or Trump himself. Maduro understands politics and has been involved in many undisclosed negotiations with U.S. officials. It appears that Brian Becker is intentionally not echoing the Venezuelan government’s position but instead trying to isolate Venezuela from those within the administration who would oppose the invasion.
The Democratic Party is the more pro-war, pro-NATO, pro-interventionist political party. Forces that deny this obvious reality and hold onto a political orientation from the Bush era cannot be trusted.