About 30 demonstrators milled about waving signs reading, “Free President Maduro” and “No War for Venezuela Oil” in front of the downtown Manhattan courthouse where Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were set to make their first appearance before a federal judge on narco-terrorism, drug-trafficking and other charges.
“I don’t understand how the US gets to call him a dictator when he’s been rightfully elected twice by the people of Venezuela in a very transparent election,” said protester Sherry Finkelman, who was born in Brooklyn.
Finkelman’s fact-free assertion ignores that both times Maduro stood for election, the results were widely denounced as illegitimate, and a coalition of 50 countries including the US refused to acknowledge him as Venezuela’s rightful leader after the 2024 race.
Officials with progressive activist groups including Human Rights Watch have denounced the Maduro government’s inhuman tactics, as well, once decrying “the country’s countless victims who’ve been tortured and murdered by government forces, as well as the millions who have fled largely because of a humanitarian emergency the government unleashed.”
But Finkleman dismissed Venezuelans celebrating Maduro’s capture as “propaganda,” despite even the Democratic Biden administration having offered $25 million for his arrest.
A smaller group of Venezuelans showed up to applaud the toppling of the oppressive Maduro regime and hurled insults at the clueless protesters as cops put the opposing sides in separate pens.
“You’re an ass—e! You don’t even know where Venezuela is!” Cuban-born Dario Blanzo shouted at a protester.
Maria Su, who immigrated to NYC from Caracas in 2017, raged, “They are not Venezuelans.
“They are paid protesters. They don’t speak Spanish!”
Will Contreres, 52, who immigrated from Caracas in 1996, screamed at the crowd, “You’re not for my country!
“Go to Cuba!” he said. “Eighty percent of you guys don’t even understand what I’m saying. You don’t speak Spanish!”
Another Venezuelan man, punctuating his invective with a vulgar hand gesture, seethed, “Motherf—kers!”
Before the groups were separated, a protester in favor of Maduro’s arrest point-blank asked a demonstrator who wants him reinstated where in Venezuela he was from.
Another Venezuelan man, punctuating his invective with a vulgar hand gesture, seethed, “Motherf—kers!”
The protester stammered in explanation that he was actually from Staten Island and just “standing with Venezuelans,” at which point the anti-Maduro group started ripping the Venezuelan flag he was carrying. That prompted a short scuffle before the NYPD broke it up.
“How much are they paying you? You’re not really from Venezuela,” an anti-Maduro rallier said.
A Venezuelan man also mocked the protesters in Spanish, saying “You are not even Venezuelans.
“You are paid by someone else to be here!
“Tell me how you like arepas!” he added, in reference to the savory white corn cakes popular in the embattled country.
Some protesters said the pro-Maduro demonstrators are clearly on the wrong side of history.
“Today we are here happy because he’s going to face justice,” Venezuelan-American Rafael Escalante said of the deposed dictator.