Forced to emigrate, Venezuelans living abroad hope for change — and to eventually return home

The prolonged economic and political instability in Venezuela has forced millions of Venezuelans to leave over the past decade, quashing many of their dreams and leaving many wondering if they'll ever return to what was once South America's most prosperous country.

The refugee agency UNHCR estimates that more than 7.7 million Venezuelans have left since 2014, the largest exodus in Latin America’s recent history, with most settling in the Americas, from neighboring Colombia and Brazil to Argentina and Canada.

On Sunday, Venezuelans will vote in a highly anticipated presidential election that, for the first time in years, poses an electoral challenge for President Nicolás Maduro, who is seeking a third term. His top challenger is former diplomat Edmundo González, the candidate from the main faction of the opposition.

Here are the voices of some Venezuelans living abroad. Some have carved out new lives; some hope to return — someday.

Most Venezuelans who have left in the past decade have settled in Colombia, where the government has set up a program to grant them legal residency status and incorporate them into the formal economy.

María Auxiliadora Añez, 60, left her home in the once-thriving oil hub of Maracaibo in 2020 to visit her son, who was already living in Colombia’s capital, Bogota. Her Mexican food business had been struggling, and she had seen neighbors and friends migrate amid a constant lack of services and frequent blackouts.

Añez decided to stay in Colombia, where she and her husband manage a Venezuelan food truck.

She said she didn’t register to vote on Sunday because she found it difficult, but she thinks Venezuela needs more than an election to turn around. “It is not just about changing the president,” she said. “We need quality of life,...