Honored by the US as President-Elect of Venezuela, Edmundo González Meets with Biden

He is believed to have won the Venezuelan presidential election, and by a landslide. But on Monday, instead of preparing for his inauguration in a palm-filled palace in Caracas, Edmundo González was in a White House meeting with President Biden.

The meeting, the first for the two men, shows Mr Biden’s desire to launch a coalition of support for Mr González, who met Argentina’s right-wing president, Javier Milei, at the weekend, and will meet with others. regional presidents in the coming days.

It is part of Mr. Biden, in the final days of his administration, is pushing to isolate Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s longtime dictator, who he claims won the country’s July election.

“We had a long, fruitful and spirited conversation with President Biden and his team,” said Mr. González at a press conference outside the White House, but did not provide details on the topics they discussed.

Biden’s administration said in a statement that the two discussed “shared efforts to restore democracy in Venezuela.”

Mr. González also met with Representative Michael Waltz of Florida, President Donald J. Trump’s nominee for national security adviser.

Pedro Mario Burelli, a veteran politician from Venezuela and an opponent of Mr. Maduro, called the visit part of an effort to “intimidate” him – to intimidate Mr.

Yet the meeting is unlikely to change the narrative inside Venezuela: Mr González, 75, was forced to flee the country shortly after millions of Venezuelans voted for him, and now lives in exile in Spain. Over the weekend, he also promised to return to his country to be sworn in on Friday.

“Anyway, I’ll be there,” said Mr. González told reporters during his visit to Argentina, where he and President Milei were seen together on the balcony of the presidential palace, holding hands. Mr. Milei fully supported Mr. González.

But many Venezuelans doubt that Mr. González will return to his country anytime soon – the government has put a $100,000 bounty on his head, and he could be arrested if he does.

Supporter of Mr. González’s most important political figure, María Corina Machado, a former conservative lawmaker who ousted him after he was barred from running for president in July, has been in hiding in Venezuela for months. In a recent video message, he continued to encourage soldiers to defect to his side. That hasn’t happened yet either.

Instead, Mr. Maduro is expected to be sworn in for another six-year term on Friday, and the real question hanging over the nation is whether the second Trump administration, which will take office on January 20, will talk to Mr. Maduro.

The election of Mr. Trump on foreign policy positions – Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, his choice for secretary of state; Representative Mike Waltz of Florida; and Mauricio Claver-Carone among them – have a history of taking a hard line against Mr Maduro. They favor heavy economic sanctions aimed at squeezing the Venezuelan leader economically rather than negotiating with him.

However, some wonder if Mr. Trump, who likes to make deals, will he enter into a conversation with Mr. Maduro. The US president-elect is eager to reduce immigration and drive one of Venezuela’s key allies, China, out of the region.

In efforts to gain power over Mr. Trump, Mr. Maduro has spent the past few months imprisoning foreigners inside Venezuela, including several US citizens who have been detained by his government.

Such dialogue may involve an agreement where Mr. Maduro is accepting returned migrants – and freeing US citizens – so the United States can ease sanctions that have eroded his economic power.

Some American oil executives, eager to do business in Venezuela, have been looking for that way.

But Ms. Machado, in a recent interview with The New York Times, said that Mr. Mr. González didn’t say much about how he would like to be treated by Trump.

Luz Mely Reyes, a famous Venezuelan journalist, said that although the meeting of Mr.

So far, only one Republican official, Senator Rick Scott of Florida, has announced plans to meet with Mr González during his visit to the United States.

The representatives of the transition team of Mr.

Laura Dib, a Venezuela analyst at the Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights organization, said Mr González needed a strong show of support from Republicans.

“I hope Rubio will meet with him,” he said.

On Monday Mr. González was also scheduled to appear at the United Nations in Washington.

Ms Machado called on Venezuelans to take to the streets on Thursday to show support for Mr González.

And, despite the Maduro government’s threats to arrest him, he promised to appear publicly that day. “The hour has come to act,” he wrote in X on Saturday. “We will see each other on the streets.”