CIA Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Venezuela Thursday to meet with interim leader Delcy Rodriguez and other top officials – 12 days after the US military operation that captured dictator Nicolas Maduro.
Ratcliffe’s meeting with Rodriguez lasted two hours and was aimed at laying the groundwork for continued communication and establishing trust-building measures, according to the US official.
The director also made clear that Venezuela must no longer provide support for drug trafficking organizations, including Tren de Aragua.
“At President Trump’s direction, Director Ratcliffe travelled to Venezuela to meet with interim president Delcy Rodríguez to deliver the message that the United States looks forward to an improved working relationship,” a US official told The Post.
“During the meeting, Director Ratcliffe discussed opportunities for cooperation [on intelligence and economic stability] and the need to ensure that Venezuela would no longer be a safe haven for America’s adversaries, especially narco-traffickers,” the official added.
Images of the CIA director’s trip to the capital city of Caracas, released by the agency, show Ratcliffe shaking hands with Rodriguez and a person identified by Venezuelan outlets as the new head of Venezuela’s Presidential Honor Guard, Gen. Gustavo Enrique González López, who previously served as Maduro’s torture czar.
Ahead of the Jan. 3 military operation, the CIA had gathered intelligence on Maduro and fed it to the US Army Delta Force team that led the raid.
Ratcliffe’s visit came on the same day Trump met Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado at the White House, and a day after the president spoke with Rodriguez by phone.
On Truth Social Wednesday, Trump indicated that the US is “making tremendous progress” helping Venezuela “stabilize and recover” after more than two decades of being a socialist dictatorship.
He also described Rodríguez as a “terrific” person.
Machado, who presented Trump with her Nobel Peace Prize on Thursday, had sought to lead Venezuela after Maduro’s ouster, but the president has said he does not believe she has the necessary support to take power.
