Gambiaj.com – (Oslo, Norway) – Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has been awarded the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, a decision that not only elevates her struggle against Nicolás Maduro’s authoritarian rule but also deals a symbolic blow to US President Donald Trump, who has long coveted the honor.
The Nobel Committee hailed Machado for “keeping the flame of democracy burning amid a growing darkness,” recognizing her decades-long fight to bring about a peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy in Venezuela.
The award comes at a moment when Trump’s administration is intensifying deportations of Venezuelan migrants fleeing Maduro’s crackdown, many of whom see Machado as their political champion.
Born in Caracas in 1967, Machado first made her mark in 2002 by founding Súmate, a civic movement that promoted electoral transparency. Over the years she became a leading voice for non-violent democratic resistance, famously describing her mission as advancing “ballots over bullets.”
“This is a movement; this is an achievement of a whole society,” Machado said in a tearful reaction to the award from an undisclosed location, as she has lived in hiding since Maduro’s disputed 2024 reelection. “I am just one person. I certainly do not deserve this.”
Her candidacy for president was barred by Maduro, yet she mobilized millions of citizens to challenge the results, insisting she had proof the opposition had won by a landslide.
Human Rights Watch says the Maduro regime has since detained, tortured, and even disappeared those who resist.
The Nobel Committee said Machado exemplified “civilian courage” in the face of repression, a recognition experts say was meant to highlight the fragility of democracy worldwide. “This is, above all, a prize for democracy,” said Nina Græger, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo.
For Trump, the award is a bitter reminder of a prize he has publicly pursued for years. The White House immediately blasted the committee for “politics over peace,” saying Trump’s diplomatic efforts, including his recent brokering of a tentative Israel-Hamas ceasefire, deserved recognition.
The irony is sharper still because Trump, even as he once praised Machado for “peacefully expressing the will of the Venezuelan people,” has moved aggressively against Venezuelan migrants.
His administration has carried out mass detentions and deportations, often of people escaping the very regime Machado is resisting. At the same time, Trump has escalated military pressure on Venezuela, deploying warships to the Caribbean and offering a $50 million bounty for Maduro’s arrest.
Analysts say the juxtaposition captures a geopolitical paradox: while a Venezuelan dissident is honored globally for her peaceful fight for democracy, Venezuelans fleeing the same repression face hostility and rejection in the United States.
The prize carries a $1 million award and will be formally presented in Oslo in December. Whether Machado can attend remains uncertain due to security concerns.
For now, however, her recognition stands as a profound rebuke both to Maduro’s authoritarianism and to Trump’s unfulfilled Nobel aspirations.
