Ending TPS for Venezuelans Whitewashes the Maduro Regime

Amid its crackdown on immigration, the Trump administration has decided to end the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) of about 600,000 Venezuelans. TPS is a special immigration protection that the U.S. government offers to people from certain countries who can’t safely return home due to, among other reasons, a dangerous political environment such as Nicolás Maduro’s socialist dictatorship. It provides legal status to its beneficiaries and puts them through thorough vetting procedures to ensure recipients don’t pose any sort of threat to the country, so no criminals can benefit from the program.

This move whitewashes Maduro’s socialist dictatorship in order to pursue the administration’s draconian immigration agenda.

The Biden administration had designated Venezuelans as eligible for TPS in 2021 based on the dire conditions created by Maduro’s dictatorship. That designation was later renewed, including by petition of then-Senator and now Secretary of State Marco Rubio. In 2022, Rubio wrote to then-Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas explaining the horrific conditions that Venezuelans were facing in their home country, and requesting that Mayorkas extend the protection for Venezuelans on U.S. soil. “Failure to do so would result in a very real death sentence for countless Venezuelans who have fled their country,” wrote Rubio.

At the time, Rubio echoed Donald Trump’s earlier words about the brutality of Maduro’s government and the appropriateness of protecting Venezuelans on U.S. soil. On January 19, 2021, Trump issued a memorandum ordering the deferral of removal actions against Venezuelans who were present in America, and ordered that work permits be issued to them. President Trump explained then that “through force and fraud, the Maduro regime is responsible for the worst humanitarian crisis in the Western Hemisphere in recent memory” and that millions of Venezuelans had been forced to flee the regime.

Trump and Rubio were right back then: the Maduro regime is a brutal dictatorship hostile to human life. But the recent actions of the administration show that the pursuit of a brutal deportation agenda — one that targets legal and illegal immigrants alike — takes precedence over their alleged opposition to Venezuelan socialism.

In order to end TPS for a specific country, the Department of Homeland Security has to evaluate whether the conditions that triggered the TPS designation have ceased. In the case of Venezuela, that evaluation would entail verifying that either the dictatorship has ended or that conditions have notably improved — enough to make it safe for TPS beneficiaries to return.

In a notice published in the Federal Register on Feb. 5, the Department of Homeland Security formally terminated TPS for Venezuelans. It stated that with the help of the Department of State, it found that, while some of the conditions that led to the TPS designation of Venezuela “may continue,” “there are notable improvements in several areas such as the economy, public health, and crime that allow for these nationals to be safely returned to their home country.”

But that is sheer pretense. The Maduro dictatorship continues crushing Venezuelans. Even the UN, well known for providing moral cover for authoritarians and dictators, calls the situation in Venezuela “one of the most acute human rights crises in recent history” in a 2024 report. The Department of State itself issued a travel advisory about Venezuela in September of last year, which reads: “Do not travel to Venezuela due to the high risk of wrongful detentions, terrorism, kidnapping, the arbitrary enforcement of local laws, crime, civil unrest, poor health infrastructure.”

Let me remind you about some basic facts of the Maduro regime. Maduro routinely expropriates private property, which has caused a massive economic collapse that has pushed over seven million Venezuelans to flee. To enable this agenda, Maduro has implemented a full-on dictatorship perpetuating his hold on power. As recently as last year, elections were held which “elected” Maduro for his third term. It’s widely known that the elections were plagued with fraud, and the U.S. doesn’t even recognize Maduro as the legitimate president.

Just as recently as January of this year, Maduro has shown the world his willingness to detain dissenters, with the apprehension of opposition leader Maria Corina Machado. The Maduro regime has oppressed, harassed, and is accused of recently executing political dissenters. (By ending TPS, the U.S. would likely send thousands of peaceful Venezuelans back to face such a fate.) The lack of freedom cannot be overstated.

Marco Rubio recently called the Maduro regime an “enemy of humanity.” And the U.S. government continues not to recognize Maduro’s government.  

In spite of all of this, the Trump administration, in order to deport as many people as possible, is pretending that these facts about the Maduro dictatorship aren’t facts. In doing so, it’s whitewashing Maduro’s regime.

The whitewashing of the Maduro regime is not new. As I’ve written before, the Biden administration did the same when it turned to Venezuela for oil in 2022. What I said then remains true: America lacks a pro-American foreign policy that will forcefully condemn authoritarian regimes instead of propping them up in various ways. The new administration’s approach to Venezuela seems like a continuation of Biden’s.

The Trump administration is whitewashing Maduro and betraying its previous purported opposition to his socialism to satisfy the goal of “mass deportations.”

A version of this article was originally published by the Southern California News Group on February 8, 2025.