Why This Venezuelan Election Feels Different

Welcome back to Foreign Policy’s Latin America Brief.

The highlights this week: Venezuela prepares for presidential elections, Bolivia weathers an apparent coup attempt, and how Copa América is furthering U.S. soccer culture.

Venezuela Readies for Vital Vote

When Venezuela last held a presidential election, in 2018, key opposition parties boycotted the vote, claiming the race was not free and fair. Incumbent President Nicolás Maduro handily won a second term.

Venezuela’s political playing field remains uneven ahead of elections on July 28. Maduro’s government has detained opposition activists, and several prominent would-be presidential challengers have been banned from running. But the opposition is taking a different approach from 2018: running under a unified ticket rather than sitting out the contest.

Despite ongoing repression, many opposition activists believe there is a real chance they could consolidate their votes and force Maduro’s United Socialist Party to leave the presidential palace. They’re not the only ones who think so: Last week, investment bank Barclays sent a note to clients saying there was a “significant possibility” of a political transition in the country.

Months of complex diplomacy by actors such as the United States, Brazil, and Colombia have aimed to coax Venezuela toward a competitive vote. So far, opposition candidate Edmundo González has been allowed to remain on the ballot. He and prominent opposition figure María Corina Machado—who was previously disqualified from running—have campaigned at packed rallies across the country. Most polls show González has an at least 20-point lead over Maduro.

The Maduro administration could still take an arbitrary move to disqualify González, much like Guatemalan authorities annulled a string of opponents in the lead-up to a presidential vote last year. But the costs of doing so have increased for the Venezuelan leader.

In 2018, Maduro enjoyed the public support of Brazil’s leftist Workers’ Party, which he has long cited as a source of legitimacy. Now, the Brazilian government—led by the party’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva—has openly voiced concern over candidate disqualification in Venezuela. Lula has urged Maduro to stick to a deal signed last year in Barbados in which he promised a fair election.

The Brazilian government has been in “permanent contact with the key local [Venezuelan] political actors, from the government and opposition, with the aim of carrying out free, competitive, and transparent elections,” Brazil’s foreign ministry told Foreign Policy in a statement.

This heightened international scrutiny matters. Over the past decade, Maduro’s strategy for consolidating power “has always sought a varnish of democratic legitimacy,” opposition activist Roberto Patiño said. Maduro’s movement “has never had to blatantly steal a presidential election that they lost by a significant margin,” Patiño told Foreign Policy.

Both González and Machado have signaled that they would support an agreement to induce Maduro to cede power if he loses. While opposition leaders have not disclosed the details of such a potential deal, it would likely shield Maduro from being fully prosecuted for a long list of alleged abuses. “We are open to a process of negotiation with guarantees for all parties,” Machado said Wednesday.

The political landscape feels open enough that Patiño’s colleagues at a Caracas nonprofit held an event with González last month in a poor district that had previously been a Socialist bastion. Organizers received threats after the event, but none were immediately detained.

In the next few weeks, election observers from groups including the Carter Center and the United Nations will arrive in Venezuela. Despite the scrutiny, sources—including former senior officials in the Maduro government—told the New York Times that Maduro is likely weighing a variety of new roadblocks to a fair vote. Those include canceling, delaying, or outright fixing the contest.

“I have to respect the referee” in these elections, Maduro said at a rally last week. “I know we’re going to win.”

If voting occurs as planned on July 28 and the opposition prevails, the post-election transition period could open another window for antidemocratic actions. Guatemala again stands as a recent example where the political establishment suffered a defeat at the polls and then tried to legally disqualify the opposition. The election victor, Bernardo Arévalo, was allowed to take office thanks to pressure from Western Hemisphere neighbors.

What seems easier to forecast is what may happen if Maduro retains power: continued economic turmoil, political repression, and outward migration. Over 7 million Venezuelans have left the country in the last decade due to its myriad crises. Most currently live elsewhere in Latin America.

Of those Venezuelans who now reside elsewhere in the region, 70 percent say they would consider returning home if there is a political change in the country, according to a survey Patiño helped design with research group Institute 2100. But as things currently stand, he said, over 500,000 of those Venezuelans are planning to migrate to the United States.

Upcoming Events

Wednesday, July 3, to Friday, July 5: Grenada hosts a summit of Caribbean Community leaders.

Monday, July 8: Paraguay hosts a summit of Mercosur leaders.

What We’re Following

Sheinbaum’s cabinet picks. Mexican President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum has announced her choices for 12 cabinet secretaries since last week. The initial slate, unveiled June 20, was friendly enough to international financial markets that it appeared to stem a fall in the value of the Mexican peso that had begun after Sheinbaum’s June 2 election.

One of the closest-watched positions was secretary of the economy, a post that went to Marcelo Ebrard. Ebrard is a former foreign secretary seen as a more moderate member of Mexico’s ruling Morena party. Mexico’s incoming foreign secretary will be Juan Ramón de la Fuente, a former diplomat and university rector. He told El País this week that he wanted to strengthen the country’s ties not only to Latin America, but also to Asia and Europe.

Current Foreign Minister Alicia Bárcena will become secretary of environment and natural resources. Meanwhile, science and technology governance will be elevated to the level of a cabinet secretary for the first time. Sheinbaum holds a doctorate in energy engineering and has pledged to boost renewables as president. Yesterday, she named economist Luz Elena González Escobar, a close ally from her days in Mexico City’s government, as energy secretary.

Wheels down in Haiti. Two hundred Kenyan police officers landed in Haiti on Tuesday as part of a multinational security mission to the country. That same day, demonstrators stormed Kenya’s parliament in protests against a tax bill. At least 22 Kenyans were killed amid a crackdown by security forces.

The police who shot at demonstrators in Nairobi hail from the General Service Unit, one of the divisions that is being deployed to Haiti. The organizers of the Kenyan-led mission to Haiti say that there will be close oversight of their conduct, but a coalition of aid groups has called for more details about how accountability mechanisms will work.

The force in Haiti will start its work to regain control of the country “slowly, without major fights unless necessary,” Haitian Prime Minister Garry Conille said. Kenya’s foreign minister said the mission would prioritize protecting civilians, opening up routes for travel and aid, and guarding state institutions.

Colombian singer Feid performs during the Conmebol 2024 Copa América tournament opening ceremony ahead of a match between Argentina and Canada at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 20.Charly Triballeau/AFP via Getty Images

Copa América in the USA. The Western Hemisphere tournament of national soccer teams has kicked off in the United States, with Latin American fans getting a taste of the country’s burgeoning soccer culture. Several matches are being played on repurposed football fields.

The Copa América is technically a South American tournament, but it has for many years invited North American teams such as Mexico and the United States to join. This year’s edition is a warm-up for the 2026 World Cup, which the United States will host with Canada and Mexico. All three teams are participating in Copa América as guests.

Off the field, there has also been cultural exchange. Ahead of Argentina’s match against Chile in New York on Tuesday, Argentine fans blasted songs in Times Square. Two days earlier, the team had spontaneously enlisted a New Jersey bakery to make a birthday cake for Lionel Messi.

In a more controversial move, a Paraguayan Pentecostal pastor offered a blessing at Copa América’s opening ceremony. While expressions of evangelical Christianity are common in Latin American soccer, many observers felt the tournament should not have officially platformed a hard-line religious leader.

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In Focus: Bolivia’s Coup Attempt

Military police arrive to Plaza Murillo in La Paz, Bolivia, on June 26, amid a thwarted coup attempt in the country.Gaston Brito Miserocchi/Getty Images

The apparent putsch attempt that unfolded in Bolivia’s capital of La Paz on Wednesday afternoon was decidedly old-school. As members of the military rammed a tank at the doors of the presidential palace, former army commander Juan José Zúñiga told reporters gathered out front that the army “has the courage to look out for” national well-being. Bolivians have “no future” amid an economic crisis, he said.

Police soon massed to detain Zúñiga, and Bolivians demonstrated in favor of the elected government of President Luis Arce. Within hours, Arce declared the coup attempt defeated.

The events occurred while diplomats to the Organization of American States were holding their annual assembly in neighboring Paraguay, prompting swift notes of condemnation from regional governments.

The coup attempt came against the backdrop of deep economic strains and a bitter feud that is dividing Bolivia’s ruling socialist party. Arce’s political benefactor is former President Evo Morales, and the men are battling for control over the party.

Morales wants to run for a fourth presidential term during the next election in 2025—a move prohibited by Bolivia’s constitution. Morales’s allies in congress have been boycotting Arce’s legislative agenda while the country experiences a dollar shortage and dwindling natural gas exports.

Zúñiga served as top army commander until earlier this week, when he was removed from his post following verbal threats against Morales. After being arrested on Wednesday, he suggested that the whole putsch attempt had been staged, stating that Arce previously told him that “it’s necessary to prepare something that will raise my popularity.” A top minister in Arce’s government rejected that claim, saying that Zúñiga had “lost all credibility.”