According to the sources, the CIA's classified report, among other things, identified the then Vice President Delcy Rodríguez as the best candidate to maintain short-term stability in Venezuela in Maduro's absence.
Edmundo González Urrutia, who many international observers considered the legitimate winner of the 2024 Venezuelan election, and opposition leader and Nobel laureate María Corina Machado would face opposition from regime-loyal security services, drug networks and political opponents, the report said. The CIA concluded, according to The Wall Street Journal, that both opposition politicians would have difficulty gaining legitimacy as leaders.
Is the Nobel Prize a factor?
The report's conclusions were presented to US President Donald Trump and are said to have been one of the foundations of his decision to support Delcy Rodríguez as interim leader instead of María Corina Machado.
Machado's decision to accept the Nobel Peace Prize has also previously been pointed out as a factor in Trump's dismissal of her, because he wanted it himself, according to The Washington Post.
“A high price”
Following Maduro's capture, Trump claimed that Machado "does not have enough support or respect within the country to lead a democratic transition."
Former Vice President Rodríguez has been fully endorsed as interim president by Venezuela's parliament and was formally sworn in on Monday. Trump has said that Rodríguez must cooperate with the United States or she will pay "a heavy price" if she does not.
