Records reveal years of investigation, claims of money laundering, and connections to Maduro’s inner circle. Washington: President Donald Trump portrayed Nicolás Maduro’s vice president and longtime aide as America’s preferred partner to stabilize Venezuela amid a scourge of drugs, corruption, and economic mayhem when he announced the bold capture of Maduro to face drug trafficking charges in the US. The mistrust that had long enveloped Delcy Rodríguez before to her appointment as temporary president of the troubled country earlier this month went unacknowledged.
According to records obtained by The Associated Press and more than six current and former US law enforcement officials, Rodríguez has actually been on the US Drug Enforcement Administration’s radar for years and was even designated a “priority target” in 2022. This designation is reserved for suspects thought to have a “significant impact” on the drug trade. According to the data, the DEA has compiled a comprehensive intelligence file on Rodriguez that dates back at least to 2018. It lists her known associates and contains accusations ranging from gold smuggling to narcotics trafficking. Early in 2021, a confidential informant told the DEA that Rodríguez was utilizing hotels in the Caribbean island of Isla Margarita “as a front to launder money,” according to the documents. She was connected to Alex Saab, Maduro’s purported bag man, who was detained by US officials in 2020 on suspicion of money laundering, as recently as last year. The US government has never made any public accusations of criminal activity against Rodriguez. She is not one of the more than a dozen current Venezuelan officials accused of drug trafficking alongside the ousted president, which is noteworthy for Maduro’s tight circle. The AP uncovered that Rodriguez’s name has appeared in about a dozen DEA investigations, some of which are still continuing, involving agents in field offices from Phoenix and New York to Paraguay and Ecuador. The AP was unable to ascertain each investigation’s precise target. According to three current and former DEA officers who examined the documents at AP’s request, they show a strong interest in Rodríguez during the majority of her vice presidential term, which started in 2018. They talked under the condition of anonymity and were not permitted to discuss DEA investigations. Why Rodríguez was designated as a “priority target,” a designation that necessitates substantial documentation to support more investigative resources, is unclear from the records examined by AP. At any given time, the CIA has hundreds of priority targets, and being labeled does not always result in criminal charges.”She was on the rise, so it’s not surprising that she might become a high-priority target with her role,” stated Kurt Lunkenheimer, a former Miami federal prosecutor who has dealt with several Venezuela-related cases. “The issue is when people talk about you and you become a high-priority target, there’s a difference between that and evidence supporting an indictment.” Emails requesting response were not answered by Venezuela’s communications ministry. Requests for comment were not answered by the US Justice Department or the DEA. When asked if the president believes in Rodríguez, the White House cited Trump’s previous comments about a “very good talk” he had with the acting president on Wednesday, the day before she met with CIA Director John Ratcliffe in Caracas.
Almost immediately upon Maduro’s arrest, Trump began praising Rodriguez, calling her a “terrific person” this past week. He was in close communication with Washington officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio. According to Steve Dudley, co-director of InSight Crime, a research tank that focuses on organized crime in the Americas, the DEA’s interest in Rodríguez coincides with Trump’s attempts to appoint her as the steward of American interests to navigate a turbulent post-Maduro Venezuela.The current government in Venezuela is a hybrid criminal regime. According to Dudley, who has spent years studying Venezuela, “the only way you get a position of power in the regime is by, at the very least, aiding criminal activities.” “There isn’t a system bug here. The system is this.
Opposition leader María Corina Machado, who visited with Trump at the White House on Thursday to advocate for increased US support for Venezuelan democracy, expressed similar views.Machado referred to Rodríguez and remarked, “The American justice system has enough information about her.” “Her profile is quite clear.”Because of her socialist father’s death in police prison when she was just 7 years old, Rodríguez, 56, had a strong leftist inclination and rose to the top of the Venezuelan political hierarchy as a devoted advisor to Maduro.
Even though she blamed the US for her father’s passing, she worked tirelessly to attract American investment during the first Trump administration as foreign minister and then vice president. She hired Trump-affiliated lobbyists and even ordered the state oil company to donate $500,000 to his inaugural committee. When Trump, encouraged by Rubio, put pressure on Maduro to hold free and fair elections, the charm offensive failed. The White House sanctioned Rodríguez in September 2018, claiming that she was essential to Maduro’s hold on power and his capacity to “solidify his authoritarian rule.” The European Union had previously sanctioned her as well.
However, such accusations did not center on her alleged involvement in corruption, but rather on her threat to Venezuela’s democracy.Venezuela is a failed state that at the highest levels encourages drug trafficking, terrorism, corruption, and violations of human rights. Rob Zachariasiewicz, a longtime former DEA agent who oversaw investigations against high-ranking Venezuelan officials and is currently a managing partner at Elicius Intelligence, a specialized investigations agency, stated, “There is nothing political about this analysis.” “Delcy Rodríguez has been part of this criminal enterprise.” An unparalleled window into the DEA’s interest in Rodríguez is provided by the records that AP was able to obtain. The agency’s elite Special Operations Division, which is located in Virginia and collaborated with Manhattan prosecutors to indict Maduro, was mostly responsible for it.
An anonymous confidential informant is cited in one of the documents as connecting Rodríguez to Margarita Island hotels that are purportedly used as a front for money laundering. The material has not been independently verified by the AP. The resort island northeast of the Venezuelan mainland has long been seen by the US as a key hub for drug trafficking routes to Europe and the Caribbean. Over the years, several traffickers, including members of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán’s Sinaloa cartel, have been apprehended or taken refuge there. Even after President Joe Biden pardoned Rodríguez in 2023 as part of a prisoner exchange for Americans detained in Venezuela, the records show that the federal government was investigating his role in government contracts given to Maduro’s buddy Saab.
As US sanctions prevented Venezuela from accessing Western institutions and hard currency, the Colombian businessman became one of the country’s leading fixers. While flying from Venezuela to Iran to negotiate oil transactions that might assist both countries get over sanctions, he was detained in 2020 on federal allegations of money laundering. In a separate incident, the DEA documents also show that agents were curious about Rodríguez’s potential role in purportedly fraudulent transactions between the government and Omar Nassif-Sruji, a relative of André’s longstanding love companion Yussef Nassif.
Emails and texts requesting comment were not answered by Nassif-Sruji, and Nassif’s lawyer disputed that his client had engaged in any illegal activities, emphasizing that he had not been charged with any crimes.”He believes the acting president is a true patriot who has dedicated her entire life to the betterment of the Venezuelan people and has the utmost respect and confidence in her vision for Venezuela,” the lawyer, Jihad M. Smaili, said in a statement. “The insinuations that Mr. Nassif is currently involved in any untoward relationship with the acting president are false.”
When considered collectively, the DEA investigations highlight the long-standing abuse of power in Venezuela, which Transparency International ranks as the third most corrupt nation in the world. They also serve as a kind of razor-sharp sword over Rodriguez’s head, giving reality to Trump’s warning shortly after Maduro’s removal that she would “pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro” if she disobeyed. The president went on to say that he wanted her to grant the United States “total access” to its enormous oil reserves and other natural resources.
According to David Smilde, a professor at Tulane University who has spent thirty years studying Venezuela, “just being a leader in a highly corrupted regime for over ten years makes it logical that she is a priority target for investigation.” “The US government has more power over her because she is undoubtedly aware of this. She might worry that, like Maduro, she might be indicted if she doesn’t comply with the Trump administration’s requests.
