You'll Never Believe What Maduro Wants Now

Remember this guy? 

I assume Maduro isn't dancing right now. pic.twitter.com/GQ6f3vNFgc

— Emmanuel Rincón (@EmmaRincon) January 3, 2026

Emmanuel Rincón is correct. Nicolás Maduro's probably not dancing much anymore from his cell in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. I've actually heard rumors that he's pretty depressed, but it's hard to know for sure. If I could be a fly on the wall anywhere today, that might be it.  

Depressed or not, Maduro apparently still has one thing: hope. 

As we've been talking about, "acting president"/Trump pawn Delcy Rodríguez introduced the idea of an amnesty bill — Ley de Amnistía para la Convivencia Democrática or Amnesty Law for Democratic Coexistence — for political prisoners late last month, shortly after she had a personal phone call with Donald Trump and Marco Rubio.The bill would grant amnesty to all political prisoners dating back to 1999, when Hugo Chávez took office, releasing those currently detained and even lifting bans on certain opposition leaders that prevent them from running for office.

Its goal is to "heal wounds" of the past, and while it would not cover those detained for homicide, drug trafficking, corruption, or serious human rights abuses, it would cover charges like treason, terrorism, and hate speech, which the regime uses as an excuse to jail and sentence political prisoners to decades in prison. 

Human rights groups claim the bill doesn't do enough to prevent prisoners from facing the same corrupt regime-aligned judicial system that sentenced them in the first place, while others claim it's unnecessary and fear it's actually designed to protect the members of the regime who oversaw the political arrests and torture.  

Either way, it has to pass two votes in the corrupt Chavismo National Assembly. 

It did so unanimously on February 5, and last Thursday, February 12, it went up for the second round of more detailed discussions before the final vote that would send it to Delcy to sign into law. However, the Assembly is dragging its feet with lots of back-and-forth between the deputies, and Jorge, Delcy's brother and the so-called "President of the National Assembly," postponed the continuation of talks until after Carnival, the public holiday that takes place on Monday and Tuesday of this week. 

So, here's what's kind of funny. Maduro's son, Nicolás Maduro Guerra, aka Nicolasito, is a deputy in the National Assembly. Apparently, on Thursday, he admitted that he'd received a call from his father. His message? "Amnesty not only for them, but for us too." In other words, he knows about this amnesty bill, and if they're going to pass it, he says it would be best to include something special for Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. Nicolasito framed it as "wise input" from his father. 

First of all, Maduro the elder and his wife were indicted by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of New York. Venezuela's laws do not override that in any way. Assuming Maduro knows this, I guess he sees a future where he returns to Venezuela, and his biggest concern is that, by that time, the new government doesn't take him in as a political prisoner. Talk about audacity. 

Meanwhile, as of Sunday, we're up to 444 political prisoners confirmed released with hundreds still detained. Many of them have begun hunger strikes. Their families have been camped outside the detention centers for six weeks now. Some have died waiting. In recent days, the families of the some of the military personnel that are detained have been able to see their loved ones, and they note that they're thin, jaundiced, and tremble when they move, and quite frankly, they look like walking corpses.  

Compared to the way these people have been treated, a little jail cell in Brooklyn is like a resort. 

So, if Maduro believes that if he ever leaves the U.S. again he's going right back to Miraflores Palace, he's got another thing coming. Venezuela plays by Donald Trump and Marco Rubio's rules now, and ultimately, it will play by the rules of a democratically elected leader. There's no place left for a dictator. 

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