Forum tackles intense crisis in Venezuela
Many began by singing the Venezuelan national anthem, “Gloria al Bravo Pueblo.”
Then, for more than two hours, most of the 300-plus people sat in rapt attention in a high school auditorium as a panel of experts grappled with what the U.S. can do about the economic and political crisis in Venezuela.
The deteriorating situation in Venezuela, under President Nicolás Maduro’s increasing authoritarianism, marked by human rights violations and imprisonment of dissidents, was deeply personal for many of the people who gathered Thursday night for a forum organized by U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston.
Cecilia Barreto, who came to the U.S. three months ago and is living in Weston, longs to return home to the city of Valencia in Venezuela. “I love this
country, but I want to go back to my country.”
Barreto said she was energized by the interest and determination she saw on stage and among her fellow attendees in the audience Thursday night. “Sometimes you think nobody’s doing anything.”
Hector Marin, of Plantation, a U.S. citizen who left Venezuela 28 years ago, said he’d like to see more attention paid to what’s going on in his native country. “There isn’t a sense of urgency. People are dying,” he said. “We need to come to a consensus.”
One area of consensus was the leadership of Maduro. Wasserman Schultz condemned him as a brutal dictator. “Almost every day we hear a new horror story about those suffering in the country,” she said. “We will not tolerate this brutal regime running over Venezuelans day after day.”
Mayor Ramon Muchacho of Chacao, who fled Venezuela in August after the pro-government Supreme Court sentenced him to 15 months in jail, pleaded for the world to help his country. Muchacho is now staying in Miami.
“We need strong and decisive help from the international community,” he said. “We need a lot of help. How much? Well, enough to bring democracy and liberty back to Venezuela.”
No one disagreed. But how to get there wasn’t as clear.
There was general agreement on the panel assembled by Wasserman Schultz that U.S. economic sanctions imposed against Maduro need to be enhanced — and extended to the country’s most valuable commodity, oil — as a way to squeeze Maduro.
Panelists also said that’s not an ideal option. Tighter sanctions might not work, and they risk increasing pain for Venezuelans who are going without basic necessities, such as adequate food and medicine.
Francisco Valencia, who runs a human rights organization in Venezuela, said the situation is dire. “Every day we receive numerous calls. People are dying because we don’t have medicine in Venezuela,” he said. Still, he said sanctions should be tightened. He believes tighter sanctions won’t make things worse for his countrymen than they already are.
Eduardo A. Gamarra, a Florida International University political scientist who specializes in Latin America, wasn’t as confident that approach would work. “If the goal is we want Maduro gone tomorrow, sanctions are not going to do it.”
There was no consensus on what might come next, if sanctions and diplomatic pressure don’t work.
Some speakers said the threat of military action needs to remain an option. Others said a military action would be a mistake. After years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, Wasserman Schultz said there was no appetite for war on the part of the American public.
Gamarra said talk of a military option serves largely to strengthen Maduro by allowing him to depict the U.S. as a sinister force contemplating invasion.
“We can’t lead with irresponsible kinds of statements that have only served to strengthen the Maduro regime,” Gamarra said. He praised Vice President Mike Pence for “trying to correct” President Donald Trump’s comment that a military option might be necessary.
Muchacho said a military option isn’t the worst alternative.
“The worst thing that can happen to we, the Venezuelan people, is not the sanctions, it is not the military action, it is for Maduro to stay in power,” Muchacho said. “If there is not strong international action soon, Maduro will remain in power for a long time.”
Many Florida leaders — including the two elected officials on the panel at Cypress Bay High School on Thursday night, Wasserman Schultz and state Rep. Rick Stark, D-Weston — have called for the Trump administration to grant temporary protected status to Venezuelans.
When the federal government grants TPS, foreign nationals are allowed to legally live and work in the U.S. without fear of deportation. It does not grant a path to permanent status.
Granting TPS to Venezuelans could be politically tricky for the Trump administration, which earlier this year started a countdown clock to ending TPS for Haitians who have had the protected status after a devastating 2010 earthquake.
The issue is important for many in Weston. Fearing for their safety, many Venezuelans have fled their country — and settled in Broward and MiamiDade counties.
Florida’s Cuban-American population of 1.3 million outnumbers the Venezuelan population by 10 to 1. But the population of people with Venezuelan ancestry in Broward, Palm Beach and Miami Dade counties has increased rapidly — up 180 percent from 2000 to 2015, Census numbers show — to more than 126,000.
That’s higher than the population of most of the region’s cities. And the Venezuelan population is concentrated in Doral and Weston, which is home to so many people from the South American country that it’s referred to by many as “Westonzuela.”
Wasserman Schultz, a Weston resident, said most of the neighbors on her block in Weston are from Venezuela, as are many of her children’s friends. “The plight of Venezuelans is very personal to me,” she said.
Evelyn Perez-Verdia, a Colombian-American political and communications strategist and founder of the politics website Political Pasion, was in the audience. She echoed Wasserman Schultz’s sentiment.
“We’re all Venezuelans,” she said. “We could be that country. What’s happening in Venezuela could spread like cancer.”
Database editor John Maines contributed to this report.