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Today on TAP from the American Prospect. Ideas. Politics. Power.

JANUARY 16, 2026

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KUTTNER ON TAP

Trump’s Venezuela colony

In the most cynical deal yet, the U.S. gets some oil, Trump gets to claim victory, and the socialist Delcy Rodríguez gets to govern.

It’s hard to know which is more pathetic—Trump coveting the Nobel Peace Prize that was awarded to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, or Machado giving the framed Nobel medal to Trump. Talk about cheapening the brand.

The prize comes with a stipend of 11 million Swedish kronor, which is roughly $1.2 million. That’s peanuts as Trump’s presidential graft goes. It’s not clear whether Machado was offering the money, or just an award that is not hers to bestow.

The Nobel Institute has already put out a statement pointing out the obvious: “Once a Nobel Prize is announced, it cannot be revoked, shared or transferred to others,” the institute wrote. “The decision is final and stands for all time.”

Despite the medal, Trump has opted for realpolitik. He accurately grasps that attempting to install Machado as interim leader pending free elections would require an extended U.S. military occupation. Trump’s trademark is abrupt violent action that plays well on TV. Nothing fails like an extended quagmire.

At Machado’s Thursday White House visit, Trump declined to follow his usual choreography of meeting in front of live TV cameras, presumably because he did not want to give Machado the publicity or give her a chance to put him on the spot.

Instead, Trump continues to back Delcy Rodríguez, the former vice president to Nicolás Maduro, now serving as Venezuela’s interim president. Rodríguez also knows something about realpolitik. Her main job as VP was to work with the hated U.S. oil companies to keep the product flowing.

Rodríguez is Trump’s kind of autocrat, a far more competent and agile version of Maduro. In his comments to reporters in the Oval Office after Machado’s visit, Trump said of Rodríguez, “We just had a great conversation today, and she’s a terrific person.”

In the corrupt deal struck by Trump and Rodríguez, Venezuela, notwithstanding the regime’s supposedly leftist ideology, functions as Trump’s client state. Rodríguez and the regime get to stay in power, the U.S. gets some oil, and Trump gets to claim that he solved a nonexistent problem of narcotics smuggling.

It’s hard to say which of the two leaders is the more cynical. Andrés Izarra, a former Venezuelan government minister who broke from Maduro, told The Wall Street Journal, “This is not regime change, it’s regime capture.”

The administration has created an offshore account, in Qatar, to receive and disburse money from sales of seized Venezuelan oil. The first installment is valued at $500 million. It has not been disclosed how much if any of this money will go back to Venezuela, or whether it will be another Trump personal slush fund. Trump’s story is that he needs to protect that money from claims by oil companies—the same oil companies that he is pressuring to reinvest in Venezuela.

“There is no basis in law for a president to set up an offshore account that he controls so that he can sell assets seized by the American military,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), her party’s senior Banking Committee member. “That is precisely a move that a corrupt politician would be attracted to.”

The regime, whether headed by Maduro or Rodríguez, is monumentally unpopular. Gestures like freeing some political prisoners do not add up to a real democracy, and token loosening will lead to more demands. But if the lifting of sanctions and renewed investment in Venezuela begin to revive the economy, Rodríguez will win more support. Halliburton and other oil services companies are planning to return to Venezuela.

Successful colonial powers of the 18th and 19th centuries used a formula known as indirect rule. Install a local strongman who has some indigenous legitimacy but who is totally loyal to the colonial master. Look the other way at all manner of corruption and abuse. If there are resources to exploit, so much the better.

Latinos have long complained about Yanqui imperialism, which often takes the form of economic pressures. Trump makes old-fashioned colonialism literal.