Tense election raises concerns of new Venezuelan exodus to U.S.

The Venezuelan election coincides with the final stretch of the U.S. election campaign, in which a surge in illegal border crossings under President Biden and plans by former president Donald Trump for mass deportations have become central issues.

The Biden administration has tightened controls at the southwestern border. Illegal crossings there have dropped more than 50 percent since June 4, when Biden announced emergency measures temporarily blocking migrants’ access to the U.S. asylum system, the White House said this week.

Under Biden’s measures, Venezuelans who enter illegally face a much greater risk of being sent back to Mexico, and Mexican authorities say they are making record numbers of immigration arrests to prevent migrants from reaching the U.S. border in the first place.

Biden administration officials speak often of the root causes that they say drive migrants to leave their homes. They include a sense of hopelessness spread by entrenched authoritarian rule, according to Katie Tobin, a former Biden immigration adviser.

“There are millions of Venezuelans outside their country who would love to be able to return, and they’re far less likely to do so if Maduro stays in power,” said Tobin, now at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Advocates for migrants in the United States and in Colombia, home to nearly 3 million Venezuelans, say they have been inundated with messages from Venezuelans making plans to leave the country to join relatives living abroad. Some expect that Venezuelan migrants now living close to home — in Colombia or other South American countries — will give up their hope of returning, and instead head north to the United States.

“We are convinced that there will be a migratory peak if, unfortunately, the dictatorship does not fall in Venezuela,” said Ana Karina García, the director of a foundation that works to integrate Venezuelan migrants into new lives in Colombia. Venezuelan migration has surged “each time an electoral event has generated hope and Maduro has remained in power.”

At no time since Maduro took power in 2013 has an election in Venezuela generated as much hope as this one, García said. The opposition, which for years boycotted elections or struggled to unite behind a candidate to challenge the autocratic socialist, has rallied around González, a 74-year-old former diplomat who has served Venezuelan embassies in Belgium, Argentina and the United States.

González is campaigning as a stand-in for opposition leader María Corina Machado, the country’s most popular politician, after she was barred from running by the Maduro-controlled supreme court. Polls show González leading Maduro by double-digit percentage points.

But it is Machado, a fiery, 56-year-old former congresswoman, who draws crowds. She won an opposition primary last year with more than 92 percent of the vote.

Venezuelan migration is at the core of Machado’s campaign. Videos on social media show her speaking with Venezuelan mothers and fathers desperate to see their children again. In one video last month, a man holds Machado’s hands and sobs: “I want my kids to come home.”

“2 Venezuelans like you and me …” Machado wrote on X. “2 separate families like yours and mine. … A country united in a single purpose: go till the end, liberate Venezuela and reunite our families forever!!”

The exodus has united all Venezuelans, Machado says, even chavistas, supporters of the socialist state founded by Hugo Chávez, Maduro’s predecessor.

“It’s become an emotional element that the opposition, through social media, has managed to capitalize on,” said Ronal Rodríguez, a professor at Colombia’s Universidad del Rosario and a researcher in its Venezuela Observatory. “I don’t think there’s a single Venezuelan who doesn’t have someone in the diaspora.”

Maduro, who has previously ignored or denied the exodus, has made migration a part of his campaign, with promises to bring Venezuelans home.

If González wins the vote, Venezuelans don’t expect Maduro to cede power willingly. Rodríguez predicts a surge in migration this summer or fall regardless of the election result. The recovery of the country’s economy, health care and education system will take years, he said, and millions in the diaspora have already built lives abroad. Even if the opposition wins and Maduro steps aside, he said, Venezuela is sure to experience months of instability, uncertainty and potentially violence.

Dosarmy Martinez, a 43-year-old mother of three in Valencia, Venezuela, believes any recovery will be “difficult and slow.” But if Machado wins, she said, she and her husband will be willing to stay and help the country rebuild. “At least we would have hope.”

If Maduro remains in power, she said, she hopes to migrate to the United States.

U.S. authorities have processed more than 800,000 Venezuelan migrants since 2021, including more than 500,000 who entered illegally along the U.S.-Mexico border. The Biden administration has responded to the record influx by increasing opportunities for Venezuelans to apply to enter the United States legally with a financial sponsor.

Far more Venezuelans are now arriving through lawful channels, according to the data. The number of Venezuelans arriving through the Biden programs has averaged about 14,000 per month so far in 2024.

The Biden administration has been working with partners in the hemisphere “to crack down on transnational criminal networks, transportation companies that facilitate smuggling, and to remove or return individuals who do not have a legal basis to remain in the United States,” Luis Miranda, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, said in a statement. The Treasury Department this month imposed sanctions on the Tren de Aragua, a Venezuela-based crime group involved in human smuggling.

Governments across the region have tightened border enforcement. Panama has moved in recent weeks to block jungle routes through the Darien Gap, and U.S. officials this month announced a $6 million pilot program to help the Central American country boost deportation flights. Mexico has arrested record numbers of migrants, including Venezuelans, transiting its territory.

Restrictions in the Darien Gap, the isthmus that connects South America with Central America, could create a bottleneck in Colombia. Colombian authorities are setting up seven transit centers throughout the country to help move migrants north in a more organized fashion.

Since 2021, Colombia has given temporary protective status to more than 2 million Venezuelans. But President Gustavo Petro, who took office in 2022, has not expanded the program, and migrant advocates say the country is unprepared for a new influx of Venezuelans.

The mayor of Cúcuta, Colombia, a border city of more than 700,000 people, about a third of whom are Venezuelan, expects a new wave of migrants. “The city will never be prepared,” Jorge Acevedo Peñaloza said. “Let’s hope it’s not another 200,000 people.”

The city is planning a new hospital to address the strain on the local health-care system — and to accommodate more arrivals.

Two such arrivals could be Yuleimy Vanesa Romero Villalobos, a 32-year-old street vendor in Maracaibo, Venezuela, and her 8-year-old daughter.

The girl suffers seizures. There are days when Romero can barely afford both her daughter’s medication and food for the family. Romero’s mother has taken in her 4-year-old daughter because she can no longer support both of her children.

Many homes in their neighborhood are empty. She estimates that about half of her neighbors have left the country. She hopes she’ll be next. If the opposition wins, she said, she’ll wait to see whether things improve — but not long. She has already packed her bag. She plans to take her older daughter across Colombia and through the Darien Gap en route to the United States. An aunt in Wisconsin has offered to help.

“My priority is to vote,” Romero said. “And then we’ll leave.”

Ana Vanessa Herrero and Scott Clement contributed to this report.