By Trevor Hunnicutt
WASHINGTON/BOGOTA (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump’s envoy Richard Grenell will meet with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Friday in Venezuela, both countries said, amid a deportation and anti-gang push by the Trump administration that has ruffled feathers around Latin America.
Asked if Grenell’s visit means the United States recognizes Maduro as Venezuela’s legitimate leader, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “Absolutely not.”
She said Grenell was sent to Venezuela with “two very clear directives”: ensuring that 400 members of the Tren de Aragua gang in U.S. custody are returned to Venezuela and that all United States detainees there are returned home.
Earlier, Mauricio Claver-Carone, the U.S. special envoy for Latin America, said the Grenell-Maduro meeting is “not a negotiation in exchange for anything.”
“The United States and President Trump expects Nicolas Maduro to take back all of the Venezuelan criminals and gang members that have been exported to the United States, and to do so unequivocally and without condition, first and foremost, as we would expect any other country in the world. And that is non-negotiable,” the envoy said on a call before Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s travel to Central America and the Caribbean.
The two countries have a fraught recent history marked by broken diplomatic relations, sanctions and accusations of criminal activity and coup-plotting.
But they share interest in several pending bilateral issues, including a license allowing U.S. oil major Chevron to operate in the South American country, the imprisonment of American detainees in Venezuela and a sweeping Trump immigration crackdown.
Trump said last week his administration would likely stop buying oil from Venezuela and was looking “very strongly” at the South American country.
Trump has said he will remove members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua from the United States and media have reported the U.S. is working on a deal with El Salvador to accept them.
Venezuelan attorney general Tarek Saab said last week his country definitively destroyed the gang there in 2023, but that his office is willing to restart legal cooperation with the U.S. in order to extradite the gang’s Venezuelan members.
It is unclear exactly how many Americans or dual citizens are being held by Venezuela, but Venezuelan officials have spoken publicly about at least nine.
Maduro’s officials have accused most of them of terrorism and said some were high-level “mercenaries”.
Venezuela has regularly accused members of the opposition and foreign detainees of conspiring with U.S. entities such as the Central Intelligence Agency to plan terrorist attacks. U.S. officials have denied this.
“American hostages that are being held in Venezuela, not only are unacceptable, but that they must be released immediately,” Claver-Carone added.
In late 2023, Venezuela’s government released dozens of prisoners including 10 Americans after months of negotiations, while the U.S. released a close ally of Maduro.
Venezuela’s communications ministry confirmed in a post on Telegram on Friday that the meeting would take place.
SANCTIONS, ELECTIONS AND MIGRANTS
The administration of former U.S. president Joe Biden reinstated broad oil sanctions in April after it said Maduro failed to keep promises for a free presidential election last year.
Maduro’s government-backed victory in that vote is contested by the opposition, international observers and numerous Western countries, including the United States, where Rubio has referred to opposition leader Edmundo Gonzalez as Venezuela’s “rightful president.”
The Biden administration also imposed targeted sanctions on dozens of officials and increased rewards for the capture or conviction of leaders including Maduro, leaving Trump limited options for further penalties.
Maduro’s government has always rejected sanctions by the United States and others, saying they are illegitimate measures which amount to an “economic war” designed to cripple Venezuela.
Trump during his first term used a “maximum pressure” sanctions policy against Maduro and referred to the Venezuelan leader as a dictator during the 2024 U.S. campaign.
Rubio, a long-time Maduro critic, spoke with Gonzalez and fellow opposition leader Maria Corina Machado by phone last week.
Grenell had said following Trump’s inauguration that he was speaking with Venezuelan officials and planned to meet the opposition, though it has not been made public whether he did meet with Gonzalez, who attended Trump’s inauguration.
The Financial Times reported Friday that Chevron is trying to protect the special U.S. license allowing it to operate in Venezuela.
Chevron chief executive Mike Wirth told the newspaper the company would engage with the White House after Rubio said the license should be reconsidered.
If Chevron is forced out, China and Russia will gain influence in the OPEC nation, Wirth said.
Venezuela’s oil exports to the U.S. soared 64% to some 222,000 bpd last year, making it its second-largest export market behind China.
Trump has kicked off a sweeping immigration crackdown, pledging mass deportations.
Millions of Venezuelans have left their country over the last decade, with many settling elsewhere in Latin America and others heading north to the United States.
Some 600,000 Venezuelans in the United States were eligible for deportation reprieves granted by the Biden administration, but U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said this week she would cut the duration of the protections.
Noem must decide by Saturday whether to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Venezuelans whose protections expire in April, according to a copy of her revocation notice reviewed by Reuters.
Venezuelans returning home will be welcomed, the Maduro government has said, without specifying whether it will accept deportation flights under Trump.
Venezuelan officials have long floated the possibility they could reject migrant flights over sanctions.
The Venezuelan opposition said in a statement on Thursday that it fully respects the U.S. government taking action against groups like Tren de Aragua, but that TPS or a similar program are crucial to the well-being of law-abiding migrants.
(Reporting by Susan Heavey, Doina Chiacu and Julia Symmes Cobb; Editing by David Ljunggren and Alistair Bell)
