Attorney General of Venezuela Tarek William Saab announced on Monday that his office will file a formal complaint in the United States against members of the Venezuelan establishment opposition for the alleged embezzlement of USAID humanitarian aid funds that, according to him, were used to conspire against the socialist regime.
Saab, in remarks shared by the regime’s Communications Minister Freddy Ñáñez during the latest broadcast of his show Cable a Tierra (“Grounding Wire”), said that the socialist regime will request the international cooperation of the United States to extradite several opposition leaders, including former interim President Juan Guaidó, who lives in exile in Florida after being deported from Colombia in 2023.
The attorney general accused Guaidó and “opposition” politicians such as David Smolansky, Carlos Vecchio, Julio Borges, and Leopoldo López of corruption. According to Saab, the individuals allegedly stole millions of dollars in USAID funds meant to “support migrants” and “rescue democracy,” only using two percent of the total for its intended use and allegedly pocketing the rest or using it to conspire against the rogue socialist regime.
Saab said that it is “time” for the Maduro regime, which maintains a fierce anti-U.S. stance, to carry out international cooperation with the United States to prosecute all those who are linked to “the theft of assets and embezzlement” of USAID funds.
“Obviously this request is based on the development of the early, and I would say with future expectations, of the development of the bilateral relationship that we aspire to as a Venezuelan state, not only diplomatic, but also economic, judicial, etc,” Saab said.
“Obviously, based on the development, we are going and we are already prepared to formalize it as we already have that experience during more than seven years of exercise in the public ministry with many countries of the region and Europe, in due time we will formally do so,” he continued.
Saab further claimed that there are 25 open investigations against Venezuelan opposition members that are part of a broader “corruption plot” in Venezuela during the tenure of the opposition-led National Assembly (2015-2020), the last democratically elected institution in the country. Dictator Nicolás Maduro ousted the Assembly and replaced it with a loyalist parliament in December 2020. Saab accused the long-ousted opposition lawmakers of having received USAID funds to help Venezuelans and migrants.
Saab’s announcement of a formal complaint comes days after the Venezuelan Attorney General, amid the ongoing dismantling of the U.S. agency led by the administration of President Donald Trump and the suspension of its foreign financial aid assistance programs, accused Guaidó and other “opposition” politicians of using USAID funds to “enrich themselves with impunity.”
Throughout the past 26 years that it has been in power, Venezuela’s socialist regime – both under late dictator Hugo Chávez and Maduro – has repeatedly accused the United States of using USAID to bankroll efforts to oust it.
Juan Guaidó assumed the interim presidency of Venezuela in January 2019 in accordance with what the Venezuelan constitution defines as a “rupture in the democratic order” that stemmed from Maduro clinging to power in a sham presidential election in 2018. At the time, Guaidó was the head of the opposition-led National Assembly.
Although Guaidó’s interim presidency was recognized as legitimate by the United States and about 50 countries, it failed to wield any actual power in the country and failed to achieve its promise of ousting Maduro and restoring democracy to Venezuela. The interim presidency was ultimately dissolved in December 2022. Following an attempt to hold meetings with international representatives in Colombia, the government of far-left President Gustavo Petro banished Guaidó to Miami in April 2023.
Maduro once again held a fraudulent election on July 28, securing a third illegitimate six-year term for himself that started on January 10, 2025. 75-year-old former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez, who ran as the opposition’s candidate in the sham July 2024 presidential election, was recognized by the administration of former U.S. President Joe Biden as the “president-elect” of Venezuela after the opposition presented vote tallies that it claimed demonstrated González’s defeat of Maduro in a landslide.
Following Saab’s announcement, several members of the Maduro regime lobbed new accusations against the United States on Monday for the alleged use of USAID funds to finance anti-regime actions in Venezuela.
During the weekly press conference of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), Interior Minister and wanted drug lord Diosdado Cabello accused the United States of using USAID to fund purported “coup plots” in Venezuela via non-government organizations (NGOs).
“USAID was used by the United States (US) government to finance coups d’état in Venezuela through the funding of NGOs. But since now the US is going to investigate the NGOs, now they believe our denunciation”, Cabello said.
According to Cabello, Venezuelan opposition members “never bothered with the task they were given” of allegedly ousting Maduro and instead “robbed the tiger in its own house and now it is angry and it’s going to get its due. Fear is free.”
Similarly, the current head of the National Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, accused the “extreme right wing” opposition of using USAID funds for the purpose of conspiring against the Maduro regime and of “benefiting personally with these resources.”
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
